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Section.,Xl45  Z 
No... 


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(ZU'-'P  , 


ST.    PAUL'S 


EPISTLES  TO  THE  COPJNTHIAXS : 


ATTEMPT   TO    CONVEY   THEIR   SPIRIT 
AND    SIGNIFICANCE. 


By   JOHN   HAMILTON   THOM. 


REPRINTED  FROM  THE  ENGLISH  EDITION. 


YELLO\Y   SPRINGS    (Oh.): 
AUSTIN      S.      DEAN 

BOSTON: 

CROSBY,  NICHOLS,  AND  COMPANY. 

185  4. 


CAMBRIDGE: 
METCALP   AND    COMPANT,    PRINTERS   X6    THE   UNIVERSIXT. 


TO 


THE   REVEREND  JAMES  MARTINEAU. 


My  Dear  Friend, — 

Had  I  the  hope  of  producing  a  Work  more  worthy  your 
acceptance,  I  might  postpone  the  gratification  of  joining 
your  name  with  mine  upon  this  page.  As  it  is,  I  at  least 
take  the  first  opportunity  of  ofTering  you  this  expression  of 
gratitude  and  friendship  ;  and  in  making  even  this  book  my 
tribute  to  you,  I  try  to  feel  that  there  is  some  fitness,  —  per- 
haps I  should  rather  say  that  I  am  enabled  to  do  so  with  the 
more  courage,  —  inasmuch  as,  among  living  men,  I  know 
no  one  who  will  receive  with  readier  welcome,  or  view  with 
more  generous  indulgence,  the  humblest  Work  that  aims  to 
exhibit  spiritual  Christianity,  as  God's  provision  for  the  deep 
and  glorifying  Wants,  that  arise  out  of  the  inherent  relig- 
iousness of  Human  Nature. 

JOHN  HAMILTON  THOM. 

Oakfield,  Liverpool,  April  \ith,  1851. 


.fl£C..i)CT1882 

THEOLOGIGJl 

PREFACE. 


I  WARN  off  scholars,  and  deep  students  of  the 
Scriptures,  from  these  pages.  They  are  designed 
for  the  unlearned  ;  for  those  whose  only  qualification 
for  the  reception  of  religious  Truth  is  in  the  desire, 
that  spiritual  Things  may  by  them  be  spiritually 
discerned ;  and  who  seek  and  worship  Truth,  as 
they  worship  and  seek  after  God,  with  a  hunger  and 
thirst  for  Realities,  and  with  a  Love  that  casts  out 
Fear.  For  such  I  think  something,  indeed  much, 
needs  yet  to  be  done,  to  bring  them  into  any  actual 
communion  with  the  mind  and  spirit  of  St.  Paul. 

This  work  will  not  serve  for  all  the  purposes  of 
a  Commentary.  It  does  not  attempt  to  solve  every 
difficulty  of  expression  ;  nor  even  to  notice  all  the 
accidental  views,  the  investiture  of  circumstance 
and  tradition,  which  were  clearly  not  inherent  in  the 
soul  of  Paul,  nor  essential  to  his  conception  of  the 
spirit  of  Life  in  Christ  Jesus.  I  have  not  indeed 
avoided  these  matters  when  they  lay  in  my  way ; 


VI  PREFACE. 

mnch  less  have  I  tried  to  conceal  that  such  things 
are  ;  or  sought  to  make  St.  Paul  think  like  a  mod- 
ern, and  write  to  the  Corinthians,  in  the  first  centu- 
ry of  Christianity,  as  one  sometimes,  with  longing, 
conceives  of  a  Prophet  and  Apostle  speaking  to  Eng- 
land and  Englishmen  in  the  nineteenth.  But  I  have 
not  gone  far,  nor  frequently,  out  of  my  direct  way 
for  the  sake  of  matters  of  mere  antiquarian  interest, 
that  have  no  permanent  relation  to  the  human  Soul, 
or  to  Christian  Truth.  What  I  undertake  to  ex- 
hibit is  the  strong,  clear  current  of  spiritual  Thought 
in  the  Apostle's  mind,  not  all  the  immaterial  ele- 
ments it  may  have  held  in  solution,  or  mechanically 
carried  in  its  course. 

And  in  these  days  of  so  much  negative  and  de- 
structive inquiry  into  the  foundations  and  history  of 
Religion,  whilst  I  recognize  the  Holiness  of  such  la- 
bors, and,  whatever  be  their  conclusions,  honor  all 
reverential  laborers,  as  heartily  as  I  revolt  from  the 
indecent  bravado  which  sets  aside  all  that,  in  all 
Ages,  the  human  Soul  has  proclaimed  and  trusted 
of  the  God  who  inspires  it,  as  nothing  worth  in  the 
view  of  a  flippant  Dogmatism  that,  with  heartless 
levity,  throws  down  sacred  things  to  make  a  pile  for 
self-display;  whilst  in  this  age  of  idolatry,  and  of 
unspiritual  gods,  of  bondage  to  the  letter  and  to 
forms,  I  admit  the  indispensable  necessity  of  show- 


PREFACE.  VU 

ing  plainly  that  we  have  the  heavenly  treasure  only 
in  earthen  vessels,  —  I  think  there  is  at  least  equal 
need,  just  at  present,  of  showing,  lovingly  and  rev- 
erently, the  imperishable  Truth  which  these  earthly 
vessels  convey,  —  that  it  is  at  least  as  important,  just 
now,  for  the  best  interests  of  religious  Man,  to  save 
the  kernel,  as  to  withdraw  the  husk.  For  all  those 
who  have  free  souls,  and  are  willing  to  be  taught, 
the  destructive  work  has  been  sufficiently  done :  the 
more  difficult  task  remains.  I  believe  that  in  these 
Epistles  St.  Paul  proclaims  some  views  of  Religion, 
not  yet  recognized  as  his,  "  the  excellency  of  whose 
power"  is  still  of  God,  inasmuch  as,  through  the 
divine  attraction  of  spiritual  Realities^  of  a  living 
Word,  a  human  Impersonation  of  His  own  moral 
glory,  they  transcend  the  perishing  letter  of  Form 
and  Speculation,  and  draw  the  Soul  into  direct  com- 
munion with  God  Himself. 

The  several  Sections  of  this  work  are  so  closely 
founded  on  the  Scripture  they  embrace,  in  many 
cases  are  so  interwoven  with  the  Apostle's  own  lan- 
guage, that  they  will  not  be  fully  intelligible  in  them- 
selves, nor  in  their  transitions  of  topic,  and  much 
less  as  an  elucidation  of  St.  Paul,  unless  the  reader 
is  freshly  familiar  with  his  expressions  and  order  of 
thought,  in  the  portions  of  the  Epistles  to  which 
they  relate.     These  Chapters,  or  portions  of  Chap- 


Vlll  PREFACE. 

ters,  I  have  prefixed  to  each  Section  ;  and  I  would 
say  here,  that  those  who  will  not  first  carefully  read 
these  Chapters,  had  better  lay  down  the  book  at  once. 
It  will  not  aid  them  ;  and  they  will  do  it  injustice ; 
they  will  not  be  in  a  position  to  estimate  it  aright. 
A  mechanical  imperfection  in  the  execution  of  the 
Book,  not  discovered  till  too  late,  —  the  want  of 
minute  marginal  references  to  the  passages  of  St. 
Paul  from  which  each  paragraph  is  derived,  —  has 
perhaps  this  advantage,  that  it  renders  indispensable 
a  previous  and  independent  study  of  the  whole  Scrip- 
tural Text  of  each  Section.  I  found  it  unavoidable 
to  introduce  some  revisions  of  the  Authorized  Ver- 
sion. In  this  difficult  task  I  have  consulted  with 
much  benefit  the  Translations  of  the  late  Mr.  Edgar 
Taylor,  and  of  Mr.  Sharpe. 

As  some  of  the  elucidations  I  have  attempted  of 
the  spirit  and  purport  of  St.  Paul,  through  examples 
of  their  permanent  application  and  significance,  may 
seem  to  place  me  in  the  position  of  a  Censor  and 
Keprover  in  relation  to  some  existing  controversies, 
and  some  immediate,  but  passing,  interests,  I  wish 
to  state  that  the  work  was  written  nine  years  ago,  in 
the  service  of  my  Congregation,  and  is  now  pub- 
lished, unchanged. 


CONTENTS 


SfixBt  ISpfstle. 
PART   I.     (Chaps.  I. -IV.) 

THE    DISSENSIONS    OF    THE    CORINTHIAN    CHURCH. 

PAGB 

Section  I.  (Chap.  I.  1-31.)  Introduction.  —  Divisions  in  the 
Church,  —  no  legitimate  Place  for  them  in  a  Keligion  which 
was  neither  a  Philosophy,  nor  a  System  of  Doctrines,  nor  a 
Law,  but  a  Spirit  of  Life,  —  God  alone  being  the  Giver,  and 
Christ  alone  the  Channel  of  the  Gift 3 

Section  IL  (Chap.  II.  1-16.)  Dissensions  from  Speculative 
Sources.  —  Unity  cannot  be  broken  in  Things  that  are  only 
spiritually  discerned,  —  with  which  the  Speculative  Faculties 
are  not  vitally  concerned 20 

Section  III.  (Chap.  III.  1-23.)  Dissensions,  arising  from  the 
Pretensions  and  Vulgar  Passions  of  Individuals.    .        .        .43 

Section  IV.  (Chap.  IV.  1  -21.)  An  Apostle's  Way  of  applying 
Apostolic  Authority  to  the  Strifes  of  a  Church.      .        .        .59 

PART  II.     (Chaps.  V.-XI.) 

THE    IMMORALITIES    AND    PERPLEXITIES    OF    THE    CORIN- 
THIAN church. 

Section  I.  (Chaps.  V.-VII.)  Speculative  Pretensions  and  Moral 
Laxity.  —  Incest.  —  Litigations . — Domestic  Relations  between 
Believers  and  Unbelievers 79 


X  CONTENTS. 

Section  II.  (Chaps.  VIII.,  IX.)  Perplexities  and  Perils  to  the 
recent  Converts  to  Christianity,  from  the  Connection  of  Gen- 
tile Manners  Avith  Idolatrous  Observances.  — Knowledge  with- 
out Love  no  Principle  of  Christian  Action.  —  Paul's  Appeal 
to  his  own  Example  of  Forbearance  from  Lawful  Things  for 
the  Sake  of  others 101 

Section  in.  (Chaps.  X.  1- XL  1.)  A  Caution  against  Self-Con- 
fidence;  lest  an  unscrupulous  Familiarity  with  Polytheis- 
tic Habits  might  lead  to  a  Kelapse  into  Heathenism. —  The 
Parallel  Case  of  the  Jews  of  old.  —  Fellowship  with  Christ 
excludes  all  trifling  with  Idolatry.  — Love  should  control  Lib- 
erty in  Things  indifferent 120 

Section  IV.  (Chap.  XL  2-34.)  Irregularities  from  some  Abuse 
by  Woman  of  her  Spiritual  Equality,  and  from  a  heathenish 
Abuse  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 137 

PART  III.     (Chaps.  XII. -XIV.) 

THE  OFFICE  OF  LOVE  IN  DRAWING  INDIVIDUALS  INTO  A 
COMMUNITY  ;  ENRICHING  THE  WHOLE  BODY  WITH  THE 
GIFTS    OF    EACH    OF    ITS    BIEMBERS. 

Section  I.  (Chap.  XII.  1  -  30.)  Unity  amid  Diversity.  —  The 
Church  and  its  Members,  as  the  Body  with  its  Organs  and 
Limbs.— The  Gifts  and  Graces  of  each,  the  Wealth  and  Adorn- 
ment of  all 159 

Section  II.  (Chaps.  XII.  31  — XIII.  1-13.)  Love:  its  Charac- 
teristics.—  Above  Faith  and  above  Hope,  as  common  to  us 
and  to  God  himself. 178 

Section  III.  (Chap.  XIV.  1-40.)  Love  gives  Precedence  to  the 
Gifts  that  edify ;  and  obtrudes  not  on  the  Church  the  Peculiar- 
ities of  Individuals. — Prophecy. — Tongues. —  Rules  of  Order.  196 

PART  IV.     (Chaps.  XV.,  XVI.) 

CORINTHIAN    AND    PAULINE  VIEWS  OF  THE    RESURRECTION. 

CORINTH    AND    JERUSALEM    ONE    CHURCH    OF    CHRIST, 

ONE    FAMILY    OF    GOD. CONCLUSION. 

Section  I.   (Chap.  XV.  1-58.)   State  of  Opinion  on  the  Doc- 


CONTENTS.  XI 

trine  of  a  Resurrection.  —  St.  Paul's  Arguments,  —  Christ's 
Resurrection  a  Pattern  and  a  Pledge.  —  The  Case  of  the  Apos- 
tles, on  the  Supposition  of  no  Resurrection. — Analogies  of 
Nature.  —  Celestial  Bodies.  —  The  New  Births  of  Death.  .  217 
Sectiox  II.  (Chap,  XVI.  1-24.)  Sympathy  of  the  Corinthian 
Church  for  the  Distressed  Brethren  of  Jerusalem.  —  Paul's 
Views  of  Duty  in  Matters  of  Money.  —  His  proposed  Visit  to 
Corinth.  —  Timothy.  — ApoUos.  —  Exhortation.  — Conclusion.  236 


PART  I.      (Chaps.  I. -VII.) 

ADMONITIONS,  AND  EXPLANATIONS  OF  SPIRITUAL  CHRIS- 
TIANITY, ADDRESSED  CHIEFLY  TO  THAT  PORTION  OF  THE 
CORINTHIAN  CHURCH  WHOSE  AFFECTIONS,  BY  HIS  FIRST 
EPISTLE,    WERE    REGAINED    TO    PAUL. 

Section  I.  (Chaps.  I.  1-24— II.  1-4.)  St.  Paul's  Thankful- 
ness for  an  Experience  which  qualified  him  for  the  Ministry 
of  Consolation.  —  Fellowship  in  Suffering  for  a  Holy  Cause 
should  protect  from  Misconstruction.  —  Explanation  of  his  de- 
ferred Visit 257 

Section  II.  (Chaps.  II.  5  - 17  —  III.  1-18.)  Paul's  Restoration 
of  the  Penitent.  — The  Salvation  of  Forgiveness.  — His  Thank- 
fulness that  the  Light  had  healed,  and  not  aggravated,  Sin. — 
Truthfulness  his  whole  Competency  as  an  Apostle  of  Truth. 

—  Letter  and  Spirit ^        .  275 

Section  III.   (Chap.  IV.  1-18.)   Sensibility  to  Human  Opinion. 

—  Paul's  Reliance  on  combined  Truthfulness  and  Love.  — 
Christ  the  Truth.  —  The  Power  of  Faith  in  him  to  sustain  the 
Inner  Man 291 

Section  IV.  (Chaps.  V. -VII.  1.)  The  two  Redemptions;  of 
Soul,  and  of  Body.  —  The  Christian  on  Earth  has  obtained 
the  one,  and  looks  for  the  other.  —  This  Spiritual  Redemption 
makes  Self-glory  a  Self-contradiction,  for  to  live  in  Christ  is 
to  be  dead  to  Self  as  Christ  Avas  dead.  —  In  this  Law  of  the 
Spirit  of  Life  in  Christ  Jesus,  St.  Paul  finds  Protection  for  the 


Xn  CONTENTS. 

Corinthians,  and  a  Defence  of  himself,  against  false  Teachers 
and  Apostles 307 

Section  V.  (Chap.  VII.  2-16.)  The  Law  of  Moral  Influence.— 
Paul's  intense  Thankfulness  that  his  Remonstrance  with  their 
Sins  had  not  spiritually  injured  the  Corinthians.  —  The  Doc- 
trine of  Contrition.  —  The  Sorrow  that  is  rooted  in  the  World ; 
and  the  Sorrow  that  is  rooted  in  God 325 

PART  II      (Chaps.  VIIL,  IX.) 

ST.  PAUL  URGES  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH  TO  DISCHARGE 
THE  FULL  DUTIES  OF  BROTHERLY  LOVE  TOWARDS  THEIR 

AFFLICTED  BRETHREN  OF  JERUSALEM. THE  LAW  OF 

GIVING 341 

PART  III.     (Chaps.  X.-XIII.) 

ST.  Paul's  closing  vindication  of  his  apostolic  char- 
acter AND  AUTHORITY  AGAINST  HIS  DETRACTORS  AT 
CORINTH. 

Section  I.  (Chaps.  X.,  XI.)  St.  Paul's  Opponents.  —  His  Per- 
sonal Infirmities.  —  His  Apostleship  denied :  its  Warrants.  — 
His  Disinterestedness  misconstrued.  —  Self-commendation  : 
its  Polly,  and  its  Justification. 365 

Section  IL  (Chaps.  XII.,  XIII.)  St.  Paul's  Qualifications  not 
from  himself,  but  of  God's  Grace  :  his  Visions  and  Revela- 
tions. —  The  Accompaniment  of  the  chastening  Thorn  in  the 
Flesh.  —  His  Claims  upon  the  Love  and  Obedience  of  the  Co- 
rinthian Church ;  his  Prayer  that  their  Restoration  to  a  Chris- 
tian Mind  may  reduce  their  Apostle  to  the  Level  of  their 
Brother.  —  Exhortation  and  Benediction.        .        .        .        .384 


THE  FIRST  EPISTLE  OF  ST.  PAUL 
TO  THE  CORINTHIANS. 


PART  I. 

(chaps.    I. -IV.) 

THE    DISSENSIONS    OF    THE 
CORINTHIAN    CHURCH. 


ST.   PAUL'S   FIRST  EPISTLE   TO 
THE   CORINTHIANS. 


PART  I. 

(chapters    I. -IV.) 

4 

SECTION  L* 

INTRODUCTION. DIVISIONS  IN  THE  CHURCH, NO  LEGITI- 
MATE PLACE  FOR  THEM  IN  A  RELIGION  WHICH  WAS  NEI- 
THER  A    PHILOSOPHY,   NOR    A    SYSTEM    OF   DOCTRINES,   NOR 

A  LAW,    BUT   A    SPIRIT    OF   LIFE, OF    WHICH    GOD    ALONE 

WAS     THE    GIVER,     AND    CHRIST    ALONE    THE    CHANNEL     OF 
THE    GIFT. 


CHAP.  I.  1-31. 


1  Paul,  called  by  the  will  of  God  to  be  an  Apostle  of 

2  Jesus  Christ,  and  Sosthenes  t  our  brother,  —  To  the 
Church  of  God  that  is  at  Corinth,  to  them  that  are 
sanctified  in  Christ  Jesus,  called  to  be  saints,  with   all 

*  St.  Paul  first  visited  Corinth  about  51  a.  d.,  and  wrote  the  First 
Epistle  to  the  Corinthians  from  Ephesus,  about  56  a.  d.  —  Acts  xviii. ; 
1  Cor.  xvi.  8. 

t  Acts  xviii.  17. 


4  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

in  every  place  that  call  upon  the  name   of  Jesus  Christ 
Sour  Lord,  their  Lord  and  ours,  —  Grace    be    unto  you, 
and    peace   from   God    our   Father,  and  from  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ. 

4  I  thank  my  God  always  on  your  behalf  for  the  grace 

5  of  God  given  to  you  in  Jesus  Christ,  —  that  in  every 
thing  you  are   enriched  in    him,   in   all    utterance   and 

6  knowledge,  —  so  that  the  testimony  [evidence]  of  Christ 

7  has  been  confirmed  among  you,  —  and  you  come  behind 
in  no  gift,  waiting  to  receive  the  revealing  of  our  Lord 

8  Jesus  Christ ;  who  will  also  confirm  you  until  the  end, 

9  blameless  in  the  day  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  God 
is  faithful,  by  whom  ye  were  called  into  the  fellowship 
of  his  Son,  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord. 

10  I  jDeseech  you,  brethren,  by  virtue  of  the  name  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  that  ye  all  speak  the  same  thing, 
that  there  be  no  divisions  among  you,  and  that  ye  be 
perfectly  joined  together  in  the   same  mind  and  in   the 

11  same  sentiment.  For  it  hath  been  declared  unto  me  of 
you,  my  brethren,  by  those  of  the  house  of  Chloe,*  that 

12  there  are  contentions  among  you.  This  I  mean,  that  you 
say  severally,  "  I  am  of  Paul,"  and,  "  I  am  of  Apollos," 

13  and,  "  I  of  Cephas,"  and,  "  I  of  Christ."  Is  Christ  di- 
vided ?     Was    Paul  crucified  for  you  ?     Or,   were    you 

14  baptized  into  the  name  of  Paul  ?  I  thank  God  that  I  bap- 

15  tized  none  of  you,  but  Crispus  f  and  Gaius,^:  —  so  that  no 

16  one  can  say  I  baptized  into  my  own  name.  I  baptized, 
too,  the  household  of  Stephanas :  ^  besides,  I  know  not 
whether  I  baptized  any  other. 

*  Conjectured  to  be  the  mother  of  Fortunatus  and  Achaicus,  who, 
with  Stephanas,  are  supposed  to  be  the  bearers  of  a  letter  from  the 
church  at  Corinth  to  St.  Paul,  to  which  this  Epistle  (chap.  vii.  1)  is  in 
part  a  reply.  —  See  ch.  xvi.  17. 

t  Acts  xviiL  3.  J  Eom.  xvi.  23.  §  1  Cor.  xvi.  15. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  O 

17  For  Christ  sent  me  not  to  baptize,  but  to  preach 
the   Gospel :  not  in   the    wisdom  of  words  [Argument], 

18  lest  the  cross  of  Christ  be  made  of  none  effect.  For 
the  doctrine  of  the  cross  is  foolishness  to  those  who 
are  yielding  themselves  to  ruin,  but  the    power  of  God 

19  to  those  of  us  who  are  willing  to  be  saved.  For  it  is 
written,  "  I  will  destroy  the  wisdom  of  the  wise,  and 
bring   to    nothing  the    understanding  of  the  prudent."  * 

20  Where  is  the  Wise  ?  where  is  the  Scribe  ?  where  is  the 
Disputer   of  this   world  ?     Hath  not  God  proved  foolish 

21  the  wisdom  of  this  world  ?  For  when,  in  the  wisdom 
of  God,  the  world  through  wisdom  knew  not  God,  it 
pleased   God    by   the    foolishness   of  preaching  to  save 

22  those  who  have  faith.     The  Jews  indeed  require  Signs, 

23  and  the  Greeks  seek  after  Wisdom :  but  we  preach 
Christ  crucified,    to   the    Jews  an   offence,    and    to   the 

24  Gentiles  foolishness ;  but  to  the  called,  both  Jews  and 
Greeks,   Christ   the   power   of  God   and  the  wisdom  of 

25  God.  Because  this  foolishness  of  God  is  wiser  than 
men  :  and  this  weakness  of  God  is  stronger  than  men. 

26  For  you  see  your  calling  [class],  brethren,  that  there 
are   not  many  wise   after   the   flesh,  not  many  mighty, 

27  not  many  noble  :  but  God  hath  chosen  the  foolish  things 
of  the  world  to  shame  the  wise  ;  and  God  hath  chosen 
the  weak  things  of  the  world  to  put  to  shame  the  mighty  ; 

28  and  the  ignoble  and  despised  things  of  the  world  hath 
God  chosen,  and  things  that  are  not,  to  bring  to  naught 

29  things  that  are ;  that  no  flesh  should  glory  in  the  pres- 

30  ence  of  God.  But  of  him  are  ye  in  Christ  Jesus,  who 
hath  been  made  unto  us  wisdom  from  God,  and  right- 

31  eousness,  and  sanctification,  and  redemption  ;  so  that,  as 
it  is  written,  "  Let  him  that  glorieth  glory  in  the  Lord."  f 

*  Isaiah  xxix.  14.  t  Jeremiah  ix.  24. 

1* 


6  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

It  is  no  easy  matter  for  a  modern  European  to 
conceive,  with  any  truth,  the  state  of  things  that 
presented  itself  to  a  Christian  Apostle  entering,  for 
the  first  time,  one  of  the  great  cities  of  Greece  or 
Asia  Minor.  The  materials  for  such  a  conception 
exist  only  in  the  indirect  and  evanescent  reflections 
of  ancient  life  and  manners  which  a  fragmentary 
literature  presents  ;  and  much  easier  is  it,  from  the 
remains  that  are  left  to  us,  to  reconstruct  one  of  the 
Cities  of  classic  antiquity,  to  bring  back  the  exact 
image  of  Athens  or  Pompeii,  than  to  people  its 
streets  with  veritable  copies  from  the  antique,  —  to 
picture  with  any  reality  the  living  throngs  of  Cor- 
inth, that  Venice  of  the  ancient  world,*  or  to  pene- 
trate to  the  varied  heart  and  inner  spirit  of  that  mot- 
ley society,  where  Greek  and  Asiatic,  Roman  and 
Jew,  trader  and  philosopher,  Egyptian  magician, 
sophist,  and  travelling  impostor  of  every  description, 
passed  and  repassed  between  the  commercial  capital 
of  the  West,  that  point  of  conflux,  and  the  scattered 
cities  of  the  East.  Corinth  itself  was  but  a  new 
city,  raised  from  its  ruins  and  rebuilt  by  Julius 
Cassar.  From  its  central  situation  on  the  Isthmus, 
as  the  gates  of  Greece,  through  which  passed  all 
communication  between  the  Eastern  and  the  West- 
era  Worlds,  it  had  sprung  at  once  into  magnificence. 
Every  thing  in  it  was  young,  fresh,  restless,  unset- 
tled. It  was  a  state  of  society  in  which  there  were 
no  conservative  infiuences,  no  venerable  usages, — 
where  even  the  temples  and  the  gods  had  no  great 

*  Milman's  History  ©f  Christianity,  Vol  II.  p.  20. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  7 

antiquity  to  boast  of,  and  where  accordingly  every 
variety  of  man,  every  new  theory  and  speculation, 
might  meet  on  nearly  equal  ground,  and  have  a  fair 
struggle  for  predominance.  Now  let  us  venture  to 
enter  this  Corinth  along  with  the  Apostle,  and  wit- 
ness his  reception. 

Gentile  and  idolatrous  cities  were,  it  is  true,  to  him 
no  novelties.  He  was  himself  Paul  of  Tarsus,  a  city 
of  Cilicia,  and  since  his  conversion  he  had  witnessed 
to  the  Truth  amid  the  splendid  temples  of  Asia,  and 
stood  upon  Mars'  Hill  in  Athens.  It  was  with  no 
unprepared  spirit,  with  no  narrow,  local,  and  unfur- 
nished mind,  with  no  incompetent  experience,  or  ex- 
clusive development  of  his  own  religious  nature,  that 
the  missionary  of  Chrjst  appeared  among  these  strug- 
gling individualities  to  announce  a  universal  and  all- 
reconciling  Faith.  With  no  surprise  or  flurry  of 
spirit,  but  with  a  calm  and  understanding  eye,  as  a 
man  who  knew  what  he  had  to  expect,  would  he 
pass  along  through  temples,  and  sacred  groves,  and 
theatres,  and  processions,  until  he  came  to  the  ob- 
scurer quarters  where  his  countrymen  lived  apart, 
and  endeavored,  as  far  as  might  be,  to  shut  out  idol- 
atrous spectacles.  To  these  expectants  of  Israel's 
Messiah,  he  would  announce  the  Gospel  of  the  Sav- 
iour of  the  World;  and  the  Jew  of  Palestine,  who 
cared  nothing  for  the  World,  but  only  for  the  Israel 
of  God,  would  denounce  the  supposed  apostate  from 
Judaism  as  the  most  accursed  of  blasphemers, — 
whilst  the  Jew  of  Alexandria,  who  had  been  brought 
into  contact  with  the  philosophies  of  Plato  and  the 
East,  and  had  worn  off  the  rigid  nationality  of  the 


b  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Palestinian,  would  seize,  with  more  avidity  than 
fidelity,  on  the  new  ideas  of  Christianity,  as  a  means 
of  reconciling  his  old  faith  with  his  later  and  foreign 
speculations.  And  if,  as  a  mean  between  these  two, 
a  Jew  of  the  old  school  should  be  found  to  give  a 
more  favorable  reception  to  the  "  testimony  respect- 
ing Jesus,"  it  would  be  only  as  to  the  long  expected 
consummation  of  Judaism;  and  without  accepting 
its  more  spiritual  and  universal  elements,  he  would 
take  it  to  be  the  completion  of  the  National  Relig- 
ion in  the  subjugation  of  the  other  religions  of  the 
earth. 

Expelled  from  the  Synagogue,  yet  with  such  of 
its  members  as  might  have  some  points  of  affinity 
with  the  more  generous  faith  (g,nd  at  Corinth  it  hap- 
pened that  even  the  chief  ruler  was  one  of  those),* 
St.  Paul,  in  the  expressive  figure  of  the  times,  would 
"  shake  his  raiment "  before  the  Jews ;  and  casting 
off  upon  themselves  all  responsibility  for  their  de- 
cision, betake  himself  to  the  Gentiles.  With  them 
he  would  meet,  if  not  a  very  earnest  or  respectful, 
yet  an  easy  and  a  willing  reception,  so  long  at  least 
as  he  had  the  power  to  keep  their  curiosity  alive, — 
for  Paganism  was  not  deficient  in  toleration,  except 
towards  a  religion  that  aimed  at  its  destruction. 
Polytheism  indeed  could  not,  with  any  consistency, 
denounce  the  claim  to  notice  of  any  new  worship, 
nor  was  such  exclusiveness  the  genius  of  the  Greek. 
Paul  at  Athens  was  supposed  to  be  only  desirous  of 
introducing  some  new  divinity  into  the  already  full 

*  Acts  xviii.  8. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I. 


9 


Pantheon ;  and  not  immediately  would  Christianity 
come  to  be  apprehended  in  its  character  of  destrnc- 
tiveness,  not  as  claiming  a  share  for  itself,  but  as 
the  total  subverter  of  Polytheistic  worship,  —  making 
the  universe  and  the  soul  the  only  fit  temples  of  the 
One  Everlasting  and  Omnipresent.  With  such  minds 
the  difficulty  would  be  to  obtain  a  reception  for  the 
new  religion,  not  as  a  Philosophy,  but  as  a  Life ;  not 
as  a  source  of  intellectual  or  speculative  interest, 
but  as  a  moral  spirit,  breathing  tender  and  purifying 
influences  into  the  affections,  developing  the  force 
of  conscience,  withdrawing  the  soul  from  the  outer 
shrine  to  the  voice  of  the  eternal  Spirit  within  the 
breast,  and  conforming  the  entire  man  to  that  divine 
harmony,  that  holy  will  of  God,  of  which  conscience 
is  the  faint  announcer  in  each  soul,  and  Christ  the 
perfect  image.  The  Grecian  mind  was  extrava- 
gantly addicted  to  fanciful,  and  speculative,  philoso- 
phizing ;  and  largely  used  its  religion  as  a  means  of 
sanctifying  its  vices,  of  elevating  its  vilest  desires 
into  the  worship  of  some  patron  God  presiding  over 
the  earthly  and  passionate  elements  of  our  mixed 
nature,  —  converting  deeds  of  darkness  into  the  mys- 
teries of  a  sacred  service  ;  and  if  Christianity,  through 
native  force  and  the  vigor  of  its  great  Apostle, 
made  its  way  into  such  minds,  there  could  be  little 
hope  that  it  should  take  no  taint  or  bias  from  such 
souls,  that  it  should  all  at  once  maintain  an  absolute 
independence  on  their  past  practices,  and  not  be 
drawn  into  the  vortex  of  the  prevailing  iniellectual 
and  practical  habits.  We  often  ask.  Why  does  not 
Christianity  work  greater  and  more  instant  effects  ? 


10  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

We  forget  that  Christianity  can  get  into  a  man's 
soul  only  through  the  existing  sympathies  and 
affinities  he  may  happen  to  have  with  it ;  and  that 
it  exercises  a  moral  power  only  through  the  love, 
and  free  will,  of  every  heart.  Now  the  Corinthian, 
though  drawn  to  the  Gospel  by  some  secret  and 
powerful  sympathy,  would  not  on  the  instant  cease 
to  be  the  man  he  had  been  ;  —  he  was  not  prepared 
to  forget  in  a  moment  his  favorite  philosophy,  or 
to  renounce  at  once  his  former  indulgences ;  and  the 
tendency  would  rather  be  to  engraft,  as  far  as  pos- 
sible, his  old  ideas  and  usages  on  the  new  and 
healthy  stock  of  Christianity,  than  to  find  for  it  im- 
mediately a  clear  admission  into  an  empty  bosom. 
Such,  then,  were  some  of  the  elements  of  conten- 
tion that  divided  the  unity  of  every  Gentile  Church. 
They  all  had  their  origin  in  previous  habits,  or  at- 
tachment to  system,  which  prevented  the  recep- 
tion of  Christianity  simply  as  a  moral  influence, 
as  a  spirit  of  Life  penetrating  and  remodelling  the 
heart,  and  breathing  its  purity  and  beneficence  into 
the  character.  Putting  aside  the  .unbelieving  Jews, 
there  were  the  Palestinians^  some  of  whom  recog- 
nized Jesus  only  as  the  Messiah  of  the  Jews,  and 
these  waited  for  his  second  coming  and  his  Messi- 
anic reign ;  whilst  others  of  them  would  accept  the 
idea  of  his  being  the  Saviour  of  the  World,  only  by 
compelling  the  World  to  take  upon  it  the  yoke  of 
INIoses,  as  well  as  the  spiritual  rule  of  Christ :  these 
two  divisions,  the  most  exclusively  Jewish,  ranged 
themselves  in  Corinth  under  the  name  of  Peter 
(Cephas  in  the  Aramean  dialect),  as  the  Apostle  of 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  11 

the  Circumcision.  Then  there  were  the  Alexandrians^ 
who  connected  both  Judaism  and  Christianity  with 
Orientalism,  whose  grand  philosophical  problem  was 
the  speculation  on  Evil,  and  who  believed  that  God, 
retiring  from  all  communication  with  matter,  con- 
ducted the  creation  and  government  of  the  world 
through  mediatorial  Emanations  from  himself,  of 
which  emanations  Christ  was  the  chief.  This  is  the 
party  known  in  the  Church  by  the  name  of  Gnostics, 
and  at  Corinth  ApoUos  was  their  reputed  leader: 
whilst  among  the  Grecians  there  was  the  philosophic 
party,  who,  like  the  orthodox  of  the  present  day, 
identified  Christianity  with  some  speculative  tenets ; 
—  and  what  we  may  call  the  Antinomian  party,  who 
were  either  the  insincere  and  unworthy  disciples  of 
all  ages,  disciplined  by  their  own  passions,  not  by 
the  spirit  of  the  Son  of  God,  —  or  the  prototypes  of 
those  fanatics  of  later  times  (and  this  is  the  tendency 
of  all  doctrines  that  teach  the  native  corruption  of 
man),  who  have  maintained  that  the  body  was  so 
radically  and  incurably  worthless,  that  it  might  be 
given  over  to  corruption  without  imparting  contami- 
nation to  the  associated  soul,  that  had  no  common 
essence  with  it,  and  was  of  another  element. 

It  was  to  maintain  the  unity  of  the  Church 
Universal  against  these  unspiritual  strifes,  that  St. 
Paul  wrote  the  First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians; 
and  the  great  principle  unfolded  in  it  is  the  practical 
spirit,  the  moral  force  of  Christianity,  —  that  it  is 
neither  a  philosophy,  nor  a  system  of  doctrines,  nor 
a  ritual,  nor  a  law ;  —  that  any  of  these  may  com- 
bine with  it,  or  refuse  to  combine  with  it,  without 


12  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

affecting  its  essence  or  its  efficacy,  —  for  that  it  is 
itself  a  baptism  of  the  heart  and  of  the  moral 
affections  into  the  spirit  of  the  life  of  Christ,  —  a 
baptism  not  by  Paul,  nor  Cephas,  nor  ApoUos,  but 
by  the  Holy  Ghost,  —  a  devotion  of  the  whole  man, 
not  to  any  theories  or  speculations  whatsoever,  but  to 
the  mercy,  the  self-denial,  the  trust  in  God  even  to 
death,  of  the  cross  of  Christ.  Here  have  we  from  an 
Apostle,  and  he  the  most  speculative  and  theoretical 
of  them  all,  an  exposition  of  the  sources  of  Chris- 
tian unity ;  —  and  putting  aside  the  superficial  dif- 
ferences of  the  intellect,  he  penetrates  to  the  deep, 
unchanging  heart  of  man,  and  declares  that  all  are 
of  the  Body  of  Christ  in  whom  his  spirit  of  love  and 
consecration  lives  and  works,  —  and  that  this  is  the 
fellowship  of  the  Son  of  God,  to  be  so  united  to  him 
by  inward  bonds,  that  through  the  imitation  and  the 
obedience  of  love  he  is  made  unto  us  wisdom,  and 
righteousness,  and  sanctification,  and  entire  redemp- 
tion.* We  must  bear  in  mind,  then,  the  sectarian 
state  of  the  Corinthian  Church  in  the  examination, 
to  which  we  now  proceed,  of  the  first  chapter  of  this 
Epistle. 

It  might  be  possible  to  present  in  a  few  words 
the  train  of  ideas  in  this  introductory  chapter,  but 
it  is  the  duty  of  an  expositor,  not  to  give  the  bare 
thought,  but  if  possible  to  let  us  into  the  spirit  of 
the  living  writer,  and  to  clothe  the  exposition  with 
Ids  individuality.  I  shall  therefore  aim  chiefly  to 
throw  emphasis,  as  it  were,  on  those  passages  that 

*  1  Cor.  i.  30. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  13 

are  most  characteristic  of  St.  Paul,  and  are  in  his 
peculiar  manner.  And  I  shall  often  have  to  ask 
your  attention  to  two  of  these  characteristics, — the 
closeness  with  which  he  adheres  to  his  object  in 
writing;  and  the  rapidity  and  effect  with  which  he 
draws  conclusions,  and  makes  applications,  without 
any  formal  approach  or  statement  of  the  prelimi- 
nary grounds,  —  leaving  it  to  the  reader  to  discover 
the  suppressed  premises.  He  is  at  once  the  most 
discursive,  and  the  most  condensed  of  writers,  —  dis- 
cursive in  allowing  his  thoughts  and  heart  free  play, 
—  condensed,  in  the  quantity  of  argument  and  emo- 
tion he  concentrates  on  every  subject  which  he  touches 
on  his  rapid  way. 

In  the  very  salutation,  occupying  the  first  three 
verses,  he  lifts  a  warring  and  distracted  Church  out 
of  the  hot  and  close  atmosphere  of  local  conten- 
tions, into  the  loftiness  and  serenity  of  catholic  sen- 
timent. He  presents  them  to  God  as  part  of  the 
Church  Universal.  He  associates  them  with  the 
communion  of  saints.  Place  and  circumstance  dis- 
appear,—  for  throughout  the  world,  and  in  the 
world  beyond  the  grave,  the  people  of  God,  those 
who  have  fellowship  wdth  Christ,  have  one  heart, 
and  breathe  one  spirit.  Inasmuch  as  each  has 
some  resemblance  to  /iim,  all  must  have  that  com- 
mon resemblance  to  one  another.  Here,  in  the 
very  first  sentence,  we  have  the  essence  of  the 
Epistle :  — "  Paul,  an  Apostle  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 
Sosthenes  our  brother^  unto  the  Church  of  God 
which  is  at  Corinth,  called  to  be  saints,  with  all,  in 
every  place,  who  are  disciples  of  Jesus  Christ  our 

2 


14  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Lord,  who  is  both  their  Lord  and  ours,  grace  be  unto 
you,  and  peace  from  God  our  Father,  and  from  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ."  — "  Though  this  Epistle,"  says 
Chrysostom,*  "  was  written  only  to  the  Corinthians, 
yet  he  makes  mention  of  all  the  faithful  in  the  whole 
world,  showing  that  as  the  universal  Church  should 
be  one,  though  separated  by  many  places,  so  much 
more  ought  that  in  the  same  city,  —  for  if  place  sep- 
arates, yet  a  common  Lord  unites." 

From  the  4th  to  the  end  of  the  9th  verse,  St. 
Paul  pi'esents  to  the  Corinthians  the  obligations  and 
thankfulness  of  spirit  they  owed  to  God  for  a  parti- 
cipation in  the  Gospel  of  his  Son,  suggesting  that 
they  should  not  by  unchristian  hearts  show  them- 
selves unworthy  of  that  grace  which  caused  "the 
testimony  concerning  Christ  to  take  root  amongst 
them," -^  and  that  the  same  God  who  had  called 
them  into  the  fellowship  of  his  Son,  must  desire  to 
keep  them  in  the  same  fellowship  for  ever. 

In  the  10th  verse  we  have  another  instance  of 
the  closeness  with  which  St.  Paul  keeps  his  aim 
before  him,  even  in  his  forms  of  address :  —  "  i^  the 
name  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,''^  into  whose  fellow- 
ship you  are  called,  how  comes  it  that  other  names 
are  mentioned  among  you, —  or  that  you  break  the 
unity  of  that  discipleship  which  you  all  have  to 
Christ,  by  taking  the  names  of  fellow-disciples? 
"YoM  are  of  Paul,  and  you  of  ApoUos,  and  you  of 
Cephas,  and  you  of  Christ.  Is  Christ  divided? 
Was    Paul   crucified   for   you?  were  you  baptized 

*  Quoted  by  Billroth,  Biblical  Cabinet. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  15 

into  the  name  of  Paul?  I  thank  my  God  that  I 
baptized  none  of  you,  with  some  trifling  exceptions, 
—  so  that  none  of  you  can  say  I  baptized  into  mine 
own  name."  It  has  been  much  questioned  whether, 
by  the  clause  "  and  I  of  Christ.^ "  we  are  to  under- 
stand that  there  was  a  Christ  party  in  the  Corin- 
thian Church,  by  a  monstrous  abuse  of  words  taking 
that  name  to  designate  some  class  peculiarity,  —  or 
whether  by  that  clause  St.  Paul  meant  to  signify 
that  there  were  an  exceptional  number  who  refused 
discipleship  to  others,  and  took  the  name  only  of 
their  great  Master.  There  is  nothing  in  the  con- 
struction to  indicate  that  those  who  called  them- 
selves "of  Christ"  were  less  sectarian  than  the 
others,  —  and  as  there  evidently  had  sprung  up 
in  the  Corinthian  Church  a  strong  opposition  to  the 
apostolical  authority  of  Paul,  a  vehement  Jewish 
party  who  deemed  his  Christian  doctrine  of  freedom 
from  the  law,  and  of  the  spirituality  of  the  Gospel, 
to  be  a  scandalous  innovation,  it  may  be  that  in  the 
name  of  the  Christ  party  there  is  a  covert  attack  on 
the  apostolic  character  of  St.  Paul,  intimating  that 
he  was  not,  like  Peter,  a  personal  disciple  and  com- 
panion of  the  Lord;  —  and  we  shall  afterwards  find, 
that  against  such  a  party  St.  Paul  had  expressly  to 
defend  the  authenticity  of  his  Apostolic  commission. 
The  two  verses  from  the  14th,  in  which  he  dis- 
owns all  leadership  amongst  them,  are  in  the  most 
characteristic  manner  of  St.  Paul.  The  dash  of 
indifference  with  which  he  treats  the  whole  subject 
of  Baptism,  when  he  finds  that  the  converts  were 
taking  class  names  from  those  who  had  baptized 


16  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

them,  breathes  at  once  his  genuineness,  and  the  scorn- 
fulness  with  which  his  natural  temper  sets  aside  all 
comparisons  between  spiritual  realities  and  outward 
forms :  "  I  thank  God  that  I  baptized  none  of  you, 
except  Crispus  and  Gaius  " ;  —  and  then,  as  if  the 
matter  had  been  too  trivial  to  live  distinctly  in  the 
memory,  he  adds,  "  and  I  baptized  the  family  of 
Stephanas,  —  and  whether  I  baptized  any  other  of 
you  I  know  not." 

From  the  17th  verse  to  the  end  of  the  chapter,  the 
preaching  of  the  Gospel  St.  Paul  declares  to  be  his 
only  business ;  —  that  Gospel,  "  the  glad  tidings  " 
from  God,  which  could  in  no  way  be  made  a  source 
of  separation,  for  that  it  had  no  connection  whatever 
with  that  speculative  philosophy  about  which  men 
may  differ,  nor  with  that  glory  of  individuals  which 
bands  men  under  leaders,  —  and  had  only  to  do  with 
God,  and  sonship  unto  Him  after  the  likeness  of 
Christ,  —  with  the  free  grace  of  the  universal  Fa- 
ther, and  our  obedience  as  loving  children  after  the 
pattern  of  the  faith  and  self-devotion  of  Christ  upon 
the  cross.  All  the  glory  of  this  belongs  to  the  God 
who  gave  it,  —  and  all  the  leadership  to  Christ  cruci- 
fied, the  author  and  finisher  of  this  Faith.  And 
who,  besides  these,  in  the  matter  of  Christianity, 
shall  presume  to  put  in  a  claim  for  an  individuality 
of  his  own  ?  Will  the  Gentile,  whose  Philosophy 
could  not  teach  him  the  true  God,  nor  save  the  world 
from  polytheism?  Will  the  Jewish  Scribe,  whose 
outward  Law  could  not  keep  him  in  spiritual  and 
saving  connections  with  the  God  whom  it  revealed  ? 
Will  the  Sceptic  and  Disputer,  whose  highest  Wis- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  17 

dom  is  to  doubt,  and  who  has  arrived  at  no  sound 
faith  on  any  rock  of  the  soul  ?  St.  Paul  branches  his 
declaration  of  the  indestructible  character  of  Chris- 
tian unity  against  the  Jew,  who  would  identify  the 
Gospel  with  a  ritual  law ;  and  against  the  Gentile, 
who  would  identify  it  with  some  speculative  system : 
"  Christ  sent  me  not  to  baptize,  but  to  preach  the 
Gospel, —  and  not  with  the  word-power  of  philos- 
ophy, but  with  the  heart-power  of  the  cross.  The 
Messianic  Jew  —  sensual,  earthly,  and  millennial  in 
his  conceptions  of  Messiah  —  takes  offence  at  '  the 
word  made  flesh,'  the  meek  Son  of  God,  the  Galilean 
and  the  crucified;  and  to  the  Greek,  conversant  only 
with  airy  speculations,  the  establishment  of  a  divine 
kingdom  through  a  suffering  Son  of  God,  sounds 
strange  foolishness,  and  not  worthy  of  the  notice  of 
philosophy.*  But  who  can  escape  exposure  under  the 
practical  test,  '  By  their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them '  ? 
Where  is  the  Philosopher  ?  What  eminence  has  he 
attained,  whoi.  fruits  has  he  gathered,  as  a  teacher  of 
religion  and  a  revealer  of  God  ?  Where  is  the  Jew- 
ish Scribe  or  Rabbi  ?  Did  he  ever  discover  for  the 
world  the  reconciling  Gospel  of  God?  Where  is 
the  Disputer,  Critic,  and  Sceptic  ?  Has  he  been  able 
by  cavils  and  dialectics  to  bring  his  own  soul  into 
the  light  divine?  If  not,  then  let  them  all  give  way, 
and,  instead  of  dismembering  Christ  by  pretensions 
of  their  own,  accept  with  united  hearts  the  salva- 
tion of  his  incarnate  Truth.  When  all  these  had 
failed  to  reveal  religious  truth,  and  to  sanctify  the 


*  Verses  17,  18. 
2* 


18  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE  CORINTHIANS. 

soul,  then  God  sent  his  Son.  When  the  world  in 
its  own  wisdom  knew  not  God  with  any  approach  to 
his  wisdom,  then  it  pleased  him,  by  the  preaching 
of  this  which  the  scribe  and  the  sophist  deem  fool- 
ishness, to  save  them  that  believe.  The  Jew  requires 
an  overwhelming  exhibition  of  outward  power, —  and 
the  Greek  seeks  an  intellectual  display  of  subtle 
wisdom,  —  but  we  preach  a  moral  power  and  a  moral 
wisdom ;  even  Christ  the  Lord,  who  by  his  doctrine 
and  his  life  hath  given  to  his  true  disciples  the  spir- 
itual knoivledge  of  his  Father,  and  practical  power  to 
become  the  sons  of  God."  *  And  since  the  Gospel 
is  the  gift  of  God  to  a  world  that  knew  it  not,  how 
can  Greek  or  Jew  presume  now  to  fasten  his  own 
individuality  on  that  universal  spirit,  or  to  make  a 
party  within  the  bosom  of  that  heavenly  Truth  to 
which  neither  the  cold  speculations  of  the  one,  nor 
the  law-wisdom  and  outward  righteousness  of  the 
other,  was  able  to  attain,  —  but  which  God  by  his 
Son  revealed  to  the  poor  in  spirit,  and  opened  as  a 
spring  of  living  water  in  the  hearts  of  the  meek? 
Who  can  claim  as  his  own,  or  find  a  source  of  divis- 
ions in  the  Gospel  of  God,  the  Gospel  of  repentance 
and  forgiveness,  and  the  new  life  after  the  image  of 
the  obedience  of  Christ  ?  The  glory  is  God's,  —  for 
the  gift  is  his,  and  all  are  his  children,  who  by 
union  with  his  Christ  are  formed  into  one  spiritual 
family,  sanctified  in  heart  and  life.  This  is  St.  Paul's 
idea  of  Christian  unity;  this  the  inward  bond  of 
the  Church  Universal.     To  partake  of  the  spirit  of 

♦  Verses  19-24. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    I.  19 

Christ  is  to  be  of  the  communion  of  the  saints :  * 
and  to  set  up  any  other  pretensions,  to  speak  of  any 
other  qualifications,  is  the  only  heresy.f 

I  need  not  point  out  how  healing  would  be  the 
application  of  these  catholic  principles  to  our  own 
times  and  our  own  hearts.  How  unavailingly  has 
Paul  written  and  preached  I  His  writings  are  turned 
against  himself;  —  his  purposes  frustrated  by  perver- 
sions of  his  own  words.  He  is  quoted  in  support  of 
principles  which  he  would  have  deemed  destructive 
of  the  universality  of  the  Gospel,  —  for  he  knew  but 
of  one  Gospel,  the  union  of  the  soul  with  God 
through  the  love  of  Christ.  How  can  men  read  this 
chapter,  and  break  the  Christian  unity  by  demanding 
other  terms  of  Church-fellowship  than  some  love  and 
reverence  in  each  heart  for  one  common  Lord, — 
some  reflections  on  each  spirit  from  him,  the  image  of 
God  I  But  we  must  be  willing  to  include  those  in  the 
Church  Universal  who  would  exclude  us.  In  what- 
ever soul  we  see  breathings  of  the  goodness  of  God, 
of  the  love  of  Christ,  we  must  recognize  the  closest 
bond  of  Christian  brotherhood,  and  see  one  of  the 
spiritual  family  of  the  invisible  Father,  of  the  Church 
of  God  in  heaven ;  —  for  there  can  be  no  eternal  sep- 
aration between  souls  that  love  a  common  master,  — 
that  revere  a  common  image  of  the  Father  of  spirits, 
—  and  whose  desires,  affections,  and  moral  longings 
are  the  same. 

♦  "  In  the  strictest  sense  of  essential,  this  alone  is  essential  in  Chris- 
tianity, that  the  same  spirit  should  be  growing  in  us.  which  was  in  the 
fulness  of  all  perfection  in  Christ  Jesus." — Coleridge. 

t  "  Schism  and  Separation." 


20  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION   11. 


DISSENSIONS  FROM  SPECULATIVE  SOURCES.  UNITY  CANNOT 

BE  BROKEN  IN  THINGS  THAT  ARE  ONLY  SPIRITUALLY  DIS- 
CERNED, —  WITH  WHICH  THE  SPECULATIVE  FACULTIES  ARE 
NOT  VITALLr  CONCERNED. 


CHAP.  II.   1-16. 

1  So  I,  brethren,  when  I  came  to  you,  came  not  in  the 
prominency  of  speech  [Argument]    or  wisdom,  declar- 

2  ing  unto  you  the  testimony  of  God.  For  I  determined 
not  to  regard  any  thing  among  you,  except  Jesus  Christ, 

3  even  him  crucified.     And  I  was  with  you  in  weakness, 

4  and  in  fear,  and  in  much  trembling.  And  my  doctrine, 
and  my  preaching,  was  not  in  persuasive  words  of  wis- 
dom, but  in  demonstration  of  the  spirit  and   of  power ; 

5  that  your  faith  may  not  be  in  the  wisdom  of  men,  but  in 
the  power  of  God. 

6  Yet  we  speak  wisdom  in  the  estimation  of  those 
who  are  perfect,  but  not  the  wisdom  of  this  world  nor 

7  of  the  rulers  of  this  world,  that  come  to  naught :  but 
we  speak  the  wisdom  of  God  in  his  mystery,  that 
hidden   wisdom   which   God   ordained   before    the  ages 

a  unto  our  glory ;  which  none  of  the  rulers  of  this  world 
knew,   for   had   they   known   it,   they  would   not   have 

9  crucified  the  Lord  of  Glory,  —  but,  as  it  is  written, 
"  Eye  did  not  see,  and  ear  did  not  hear,  neither  entered 
into  the  heart  of  man,  the  things  which  God  prepared  for 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  21 

10  them  that  love  Him.  "  *  But  God  has  revealed  them 
to   us  through  his  t  spirit ;  for  the  Spirit    searcheth  all 

Jl  things,  even  the  deeps  of  God.  For  what  man  knoweth 
the  things  of  a  man,  save  the  spirit  of  the  man  which  is 
in  him  ?  even  so  the  things  of  God  none  knoweth,  save 

12  the  spirit  of  God.  Now  we  have  received  not  the  spirit 
of  the  world,  but  the  spirit  that  is  of  God,  that  we  might 
know  the  things  that  have  been  graciously  given  to  us  by 

13  God  :  which  things  we  publish,  not  in  words  [discourse] 
taught  by  human  wisdom,  but  in  words  [discourse]  taught 
by  the  spirit,  explaining  the  spiritual  by  the  spiritual.^ 

14  But  the  animal  man  receiveth  not  the  things  of  the 
spirit  of  God,  for  they  are  foolishness  to  him,  and  he  is 
not  able  to  know  them,  because  spiritually  are  they  dis- 

15  cerned.  But  he  who  is  spiritual  discerneth  all  things, 
yet  himself  is  discerned  by  no  one.  For,  "  Who  hath 
known   the  mind   of  the   Lord,   that    he    may   instruct 

16  Him  ?  "  II     But  we  have  the  mind  of  Christ. 


What  is  Christianity  ?  It  is  a  practical  power,  a 
living  energy,  for  the  purpose  of  drawing  the  soul 
of  man  into  connection  with  the  spirit  of  God.  And 
this  it  does,  by  awakening  the  spiritual  affections  of 
the  mind  through  the  impulse  of  sympathy  with 
that  heavenly  model  of  humanity,  who  exhibited 
all  the  mixed  elements  of  our  nature  in  a  state  of 
harmony  with  the  will  of  God.  Whenever  it  is  the 
medium  of  this  divine  attraction,  whenever  it  brings 

*  Isaiah  Ixiv.  4. 

t  Or  more  probably,  "  through  the  spirit."  —  Grieshach. 

X  Or,  "  to  those  who  are  spiritual."  ||  Isaiah  xl.  13,  14. 


22  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

a  soul  into  praetical  communion  with  the  fountain 
of  love  and  holiness,  Christianity  has  accomplished 
its  highest  object ;  it  has  drawn  a  new  member  into 
the  Church  of  God,  a  new  subject  into  the  kingdom 
of  Heaven.  And  if  it  has  really  connected  a  soul 
with  God,  it  matters  not  what  was  the  particular 
feature  of  the  full  and  perfect  Christ  that  found  a 
point  of  sympathy  in  the  human  heart,  through 
which  it  was  enabled  to  introduce  itself  into  the  af- 
fections, and  imprint  a  divine  image  on  the  moral 
nature.  Christ  is  «  Tnpf]ptnr  bpf.wppn  man  and  God, 
when,  by  some  feeling  of  union  with  himself,  some 
recognition  communicated  from  him  of  that  Heav- 
enly Father  of  whom  he  is  the  image,  he  leads 
any  heart,  through  this  excitement  of  its  spiritual 
nature,  to  unite  itself  in  its  inward  life  to  the  Father 
of  spirits.  This  attraction  to  God  through  the 
power  of  his  Christ  is  the  essential  spirit  of  Chris- 
tianity,—  what  St.  Paul  calls  "the  energy  of  God  in 
the  Gospel."  *  Christianity  is  an  instrument  for 
effecting  this  purpose.  Christ  is  the  means  that 
the  wisdom  of  God,  and  the  power  of  God,  devised 
for  this  end.  The  infinite  Father,  removed  by  their 
sins,  and  outward  superstitions,  and  speculative  phi- 
losophies, from  all  spiritual  communion  with  the 
hearts  of  his  children,  prepared  a  practical  method 
for  reuniting  with  himself  these  broken  bonds  of 
the  human  soul.  He  manifested  himself  in  Christ, 
—  he  showed  in  his  Son  the  image  of  his  own  love 
and  holiness,  that  all  his  other  children,  drawn  by 

*  Rom.  i.  16. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  23 

this  living  appeal  to  that  divine  spirit  which  is  in  us 
all,  might  recognize  in  Christ  the  perfection  of  their 
nature,  and  through  him  be  led  upwards  to  the 
common  source  of  goodness,  —  to  his  Father  and  our 
Father,  to  his  God  and  our  God :  "  This  is  life 
eternal,  to  know  thee  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus 
Christ  whom  thou  hast  sent."  All  those  whom  this 
love  of  Christ  led  to  the  love  of  God  were  the  par- 
takers of  a  common  spirit ;  —  a  divine  principle  of 
life  operated  within  their  souls,  in  virtue  of  which 
they  were  the  Church  Universal  —  the  family  of  the 
Heavenly  Father,  —  the  branches  in  connection  with 
the  living  vine,  the  body  of  Christ. 

There  are  but  two  ways,  not  ways  of  sin,  in 
which  this  Christian  unity  can  be  broken.  This  in- 
ward communication  of  the  heart  with  God,  through 
the  spiritual  attraction  of  Christ,  may  be  represented 
as  so  intimately  connected  with  certain  outward 
forms  of  devotion,  or  with  certain  systems  of  thought, 
that  independently  of  them  it  can  have  no  effective 
existence.  The  inward  reality,  the  state  of  the 
affections  in  regard  to  God  and  Christ,  may  be  rep- 
resented as  absolutely  dependent  on  the  outward 
methods  which  certain  men  have  found  effectual  in 
their  own  cases,  or  through  some  intellectual  pecu- 
liarities have  imagined  to  be  necessary.  This  is  to 
violate  the  unity  of  the  Christian  spirit,  —  this  is,  in 
the  language  of  St.  Paul,  "  to  preach  another  Gos- 
pe^''  to  set  aside  as  insufficient  God's  instrument 
of  salvation.  God  has  set  forth  his  Christ  as  the 
means  of  drawing  souls  to  himself,  through  moral 
sympathy  with  his  Image ;  and  all  who  are  so  at- 


24  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tracted  become  his  spiritual  children,  and  through 
that  principle  in  their  souls  which  unites  them  with 
Christ  they  are  endowed  with  power  to  become  sons 
of  God,  after  the  likeness  of  him  who  attracted  them, 
of  the  Lord  who  moved  and  won  the  better  spirit  in 
their  hearts.  But  there  have  always  been  two  classes 
of  men  who  have  not  been  contented  with  the  moral 
power  of  God's  Christ,  as  the  medium  of  divine 
attraction  and  the  instrument  of  salvation.  These 
are,  —  first,  the  superstitious,  whose  states  of  soul  are 
excited  only  by  states  of  sense,  and  who  cannot  con- 
ceive the  Divine  Spirit  communicating  itself  to  man 
except  through  the  observances  with  which  in  their 
own  case  they  have  exclusively  associated  the  opera- 
tions of  His  grace  ;  —  and,  secondly,  that  class  of 
minds  in  whom  the  speculative  is  the  predominating 
element,  and  who,  from  some  cold  bias,  or  stern 
enthusiasm,  of  the  speculative  reason,  connect  the 
saving  agencies  of  God,  not  with  the  spiritual  af- 
fections of  the  believer's  heart,  but  with  the  theolog- 
ical system  that  recommends  itself  to  his  states  of 
thought.  The  Roman  Catholic,  and  the  members 
of  the  Anglican  Church,  the  sacerdotal  part  of  the 
Church  of  England,  are,  amongst  us,  the  representa- 
tives of  the  superstitious  Christian, —  of  the  Jewish 
Christians  of  the  days  of  St  Paul.  They  say  that 
a  soul  cannot  be  led  into  communion  with  God 
through  the  love  of  Christ  alone.  They  say  that 
though  Christ  is  the  only  mediator,  or  means  of  at- 
traction, between  man  and  God,  yet  that  there  is 
a  necessity  for  other  mediators  between  man  and 
Christ,  —  and  that  there  is  no  true  sympathy  with 


Ir   COK.    CHAP.    II. 


25 


Jesus,  except  in  those  who  have  received  the  rite  of 
baptism  from  a  consecrated  Priest  in  the  direct  line 
of  the  Apostolical  succession,  and  who  have  par- 
taken of  the  Lord's  Supper  from  legitimate  hands. 
These  are  the  counterparts  of  those  Corinthian  op- 
ponents of  St.  Paul,  the  Jewish  Christians,  who 
maintained  that  Christ  drew  to  God  only  the  cir- 
cumcised, and  that  the  Holy  Spirit  disregarded  the 
state  of  the  affections  and  their  moral  oneness  with 
Jesus,  unless  they  were  found  keeping  the  Jewish 
law.  The  dogmatical  Christians  of  this  day,  under 
all  their  varieties,  are  the  counterparts  of  the  specu- 
lative Christianity  that  prevailed  among  the  Gentile 
converts  of  Corinth.  They  deny  that  Christ  touches 
a  soul  with  the  spirit  of  God  through  the  power  of 
his  character,  and  the  overflowing  fulness  of  that 
spirit  in  himself.  They  deny  this  direct  spiritual 
attraction.  They  affirm  that  Christ  touches  a  soul 
with  the  love  of  God,  and  sanctifies  it  by  a  divine 
affection,  only  when  it  adopts  certain  views  of  the 
metaphysical  essence  of  the  Deity,  —  only  when  it 
receives  a  certain  theory  of  the  nature  of  Evil,  and  of 
God's  connection  with  it,  and,  in  the  spirit  of  the 
Gnostic  Emanations,  breaks  the  unity  of  God  into 
three  personalities,  —  the  Father  absolute  and  self- 
existent, —  the  Son,  the  first  Emanation,  eternally 
proceeding  from  the  Father,  —  and  the  Holy  Spirit, 
the  second  Emanation,  eternally  proceeding  from 
the  Father  and  the  Son.  Of  these  dogmatical 
Christians  of  our  day,  who  make  Salvation  de- 
pend on  an  orthodoxy,  and  moral  sympathy  with 
God  and  with  his  Christ  inseparable  from  certain 


26  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

speculative  tenets,  the  philosophic,  or  theosophic, 
Christians  of  St.  Paul's  day,  whether  of  the  Grecian 
or  of  the  Oriental  school,  were  the  counterparts. 
It  gratifies  me  to  be  able  to  present,  in  the  words 
of  Blanco  White,  a  lively  and  accurate  picture  of 
that  state  of  philosophical  orthodoxy  (or  theosophy, 
a  pretended  insight  into  the  mysteries  of  God's 
nature  and  of  the  modes  of  his  operation  in  the 
w^orld),  of  that  speculative  dogmatism  at  Corinth, 
against  the  influence  of  which  St.  Paul  contended  as 
destructive  of  the  catholic  spirit  of  Christianity:  — 

"  Christianity  had  been  published  only  a  very  few 
years,  when  all  the  mystic  and  speculative  sects 
commenced  a  series  of  efforts  to  incorporate  the 
Gospel  with  their  own  tenets,  and  to  graft  their 
peculiar  notions  on  the  young  and  vigorous  stock, 
whose  branches,  they  could  not  but  perceive,  were 
about  to  spread  far  and  wide.  Although  the  writers 
of  the  New  Testament  do  not  mention  the  name  of 
any  philosophical  sect  except  the  Pharisees  and 
Sadducees,  it  is  clear  to  those  acquainted  with  the 
doctrines  of  Eastern  philosophy,  that  the  notions 
from  which  Paul  especially  apprehended  a  danger 
to  the  simplicity  of  the  Gospel  belonged  to  those 
mystic  systems,  which,  in  some  instances  combined 
with  Judaism,  in  others  directly  opposing  it,  were 
widely  diffused  soon  after,  under  the  name  of  Gnosis. 

"  But  no  warnings  were  sufficient  to  prevent  a 
rapid  growth  of  the  evil  which  that  Apostle  feared 
and  opposed.  Men  whose  resources  for  wealth  and 
distinction  lay  in  the  admiration  of  the  multitude, 
saw  a  most  favorable  opportunity  of  rising  in  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  27 

world  by  availing  themselves  of  the  ardor  with 
which  the  primitive  converts  had  embraced  the 
Gospel.  Vain  babblers,  pretending  to  a  deep  and 
extensive  knowledge  of  the  invisible  world,  flocked 
to  the  infant  Christian  communities ;  and,  such  was 
their  power  over  the  ignorant  and  simple  minds 
which  made  up  the  great  majorities  of  those  so- 
cieties, that  the  founders  of  them  found  it  difficult  to 
maintain  their  own  authority  against  them.  Paul's 
distressing  difficulties  at  Corinth  are  too  vividly  and 
feelingly  described,  in  his  two  Epistles  to  the  Church 
of  that  great  city,  to  require  assistance  from  another 
pen.  But  no  tolerably  well  instructed  reader  of  the 
New  Testament  can  doubt  that  Paul's  rivals  be- 
longed to  the  class  of  Judaeo-philosophical  specula- 
tists.  Paul's  express  determination  to  lay  down  all 
claims  to  that  kind  of  knowledge  which  our  version 
denominates  '  ivisdom,''  —  to  confine  his  teaching  to 
the  doctrine  '  of  Jesus  Christ  and  him  crucified,'  — 
clearly  points  out  by  contrast  what  kind  of  preach- 
ing had  seduced  the  minds  of  his  converts.  It  is 
true,  the  Apostle  mentions  the  names  of  James, 
Cephas,  and  ApoUos,  men  who  seem  to  have  been 
guiltless  of  the  spirit  of  party  which  made  use  of 
their  names  to  oppose  the  authority  of  Paul.  That 
the  persons  thus  named  were  not  really  leaders  of 
those  divisions,  is  proved  by  the  appearance  of  Paul's 
own  name  as  the  watchword  of  a  party.  Even 
the  name  of  Christ  was,  we  find,  used  for  a  similar 
purpose.  The  fact  seems  to  have  been,  that,  when 
various  intruders  undertook  to  reduce  the  Gospel  to 
a  philosophic   system,   each  of  them  pretended  to 


28  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

build  his  own  speculations  on  the  peculiar  views  — 
sometimes  real,  sometimes  supposed  —  of  the  persons 
whose  names  they  adopted  as  a  party  distinction. 

"Besides  the  many  remarkable  passages  of  the 
two  Epistles  to  the  Corinthians,  in  which  Paul's 
renunciation  of  all  scientific  teaching  pointedly 
marks,  in  his  rivals,  a  dangerous  affectation  of  deep 
philosophy,  there  is  a  circumstance  in  the  notices 
preserved  concerning  ApoUos  which  is  strongly  con- 
firmatory of  the  view,  that  the  attempts  of  various 
teachers  to  theorize  on  Christianity  was  the  chief 
source  of  Paul's  anxiety.  It  is  on  record  that  Apollos 
was  a  native  of  Alexandria,  the  great  seat  of  specu- 
lative philosophy  at  that  period.  This  fact  alone 
would  be  a  fair  ground  for  conjecturing  that  he 
belonged  to  the  numerous  class  of  Alexandrian  Jews 
who,  like  Philo,  united  the  study  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment with  the  idealistic  and  mystic  system  which 
was  taught  in  the  schools  of  that  great  city.  But 
this  conjecture  will  grow  almost  into  certainty 
when  the  word  which  in  the  English  version  is 
translated  eloquent  shall  be  expressed  by  learned, 
which  gives  the  true  sense  in  that  passage.  In  the 
public  disputations  with  the  Jews,  Apollos  must  have 
found  it  necessary  to  employ  all  the  subtlety  of  the 
Alexandrian  school  in  defence  of  Christianity.  He 
may  at  a  subsequent  period  have  been  checked  by 
Paul  in  the  use  of  weapons  which,  though  of  ser- 
vice in  dialectic  contests,  would  be  eventually  inju- 
rious to  the  simplicity  of  the  Christian  system.  But 
vain  and  light-minded  Christians  would  naturally 
be   allured  by   the  pubHc  triumph   of  the    Alexan- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  29 

drian,  to  imitate,  and  (as  second-rate  minds  will 
always  do)  to  exaggerate  Apollos's  manner  and 
method.  As  we  have  the  most  powerful  reasons  to 
believe  that  Apollos  himself  was  not  actually  at  the 
head  of  an  anti-Paulistic  party,  but  remained  in 
close  friendship  with  the  Apostle,  we  may  safely 
conclude  that  his  name  was  adopted  for  the  purpose 
of  expressing  the  nature  of  the  system  which  his 
imitators  professed  to  follow.  In  a  similar  manner 
we  must  conceive  that  the  names  of  James  *  (who,  as 
the  local  president  of  the  congregation  at  Jerusalem, 
could  not  reside  at  Corinth)  and  of  Cephas  (who,  as 
the  Apostle  of  the  Circumcision,  is  not  likely  to  have 
ever  been  in  Greece)  were  taken  by  other  portions 
of  the  Corinthian  Church,  under  the  guidance  of 
teachers  who  respectively  pretended  to  follow  the 
views  which  they  described  as  peculiar  to  each  of 
those  distinguished  Apostles."  f ' 

In  contrast  to  such  teachers,  St.  Paul,  in  our 
present  chapter,  refers  both  to  the  matter  and  the 
manner  of  his  own  ministration  of  the  Gospel.  He 
did  not  teach  it  as  a  Rhetorician,  to  attract  admiration 
to  himself,  and  give  more  lively  impressions  of  Paul 
the  Orator  than  of  Christ  the  Redeemer  from  sin,  — 
nor  as  a  Philosopher^  to  raise  doubtful  questions  on 
metaphysical  subjects,  and  become  the  leader  of  a 
speculative  School ;  but  as  the  Apostle  of  Jesus 
Christ  he  proclaimed  to  the  hearts  of  men  the  prac- 
tical  and    life-giving    Gospel,   that    "  God    was   in 


*  This  is  a  mistake :  James  is  not  mentioned  in  this  connection, 
t  "  Heresy  and  Orthodoxy." 
3* 


30  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Christ  reconciling  the  world  unto  himself";  that  by 
the  universal  Saviour  all  distinctions  were  for  ever 
destroyed,  and  the  whole  family  of  God  to  grow 
into  the  common  likeness  of  that  well-beloved  Son, 
—  for  that  now  neither  circumcision  availeth  any 
thing,  nor  uncircumcision,  but  the  renewal  of  the 
affections  after  the  image  of  the  Lord.  Where  could 
an  entrance  be  found  for  party  divisions  in  a  Doctrine 
that  professed  nothing,  that  aimed  at  nothing,  except 
to  awaken  the  consciousness  of  sin  within  the  heart, 
and,  through  trust  in  the  God  of  holiness  and  love 
revealed  in  Jesus,  to  lead  it  to  repentance  and  to  life  ? 
All  who  felt  this  love  of  Christ  constraining  them, 
cleansing  their  souls  through  the  divine  image  that 
had  taken  possession  of  their  affections,  and,  through 
the  Mercy  it  proclaimed,  encouraging  their  penitence 
to  look  for  pardon  from  their  God,  must  of  necessity 
be  of  one  communion  ;  —  for  this  Gospel  sentiment 
and  hope  could  create  no  divisions  amongst  those 
who  had  it,  —  and  those  who  had  it  not  were  out- 
side the  Christian  pale,  and,  so  far,  could  make  no 
schisms  within  it.  Now  whence  comes  this  Gospel 
sentiment,  this  new  principle  of  life?  Were  there 
any  who  had  the  exclusive  power  of  communicating 
it  ?  Were  there  any  who  had  power  of  withhold- 
ing it  ?  Did  it  require  to  be  introduced  by  any  in- 
tricate reasonings,  by  any  subtle  dialectics,  which 
only  the  Masters  in  philosophy  had  at  their  com- 
mand? Not  so,  says  St.  Paul:  —  it  is  a  spiritual 
feeling,  excited  by  moral  sympathy,  as  soon  as 
Christ  is  offered  to  the  hearts  that  are  susceptible  of 
the   sentiment ;  —  and  in  whatever  bosom  there   is 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  31 

not  enough  of  the  spirit  of  God  to  cause  that  moral 
attraction  to  take  place,  neither  philosophy,  nor 
outward  forms,  nor  aught  else  but  the  divine  image 
of  goodness  kept  before  the  heart,  can  awaken  the 
slumbering  sensibilities  which  are  the  very  faculties 
of  spiritual  apprehension,  and  which,  as  soon  as  they 
are  alive,  behold  in  Christ  the  solution  of  their  own 
struggling  and  imperfect  existence,  their  ideal  and 
their  rest.  In  regard  to  a  sentiment  so  spiritual,  a 
sympathy  with  the  Image  of  God,  where  is  the 
possibility  of  introducing  party  divisions,  and  vio- 
lating Christian  unity?  There  can  be  but  two 
parties,  —  those  that  have  the  sentiment,  and  those 
that  have  it  not.  All  Christians  constitute  the  one,  — 
and  as  for  the  other,  in  relation  to  Christian  unity 
they  are  not  in  question.  Such  is  the  argument  of 
St.  Paul  in  this  second  chapter.  Let  us  follow  him 
through  it. 

(Verse  1.)  "  And  I,  brethren,  came  to  you  not  in 
the  pretensions  of  a  Rhetorician  or  of  a  Philosopher 
to  preach  the  Gospel  of  God ;  for  I  determined  to 
profess  no  knowledge  amongst  you,  except  the 
knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ,  even  him  the  crucified. " 
I  refused,  says  St.  Paul,  to  connect  the  practical 
Gospel,  the  divine  principle  that  showed  itself  in  the 
life  and  death  of  Christ,  with  any  speculative  tenets 
whatsoever.  "  Christ  crucified "  was  to  every  dis- 
ciple the  symbol  of  Christian  faith  and  practice,  the 
image  of  a  life  passed  and  sustained  by  a  spirit  in 
communion  with  God.  This  symbol  is  powerfully 
expressive ;  and  the  Scriptural  references  to  it  leave 
no  doubt  that  it  is  a  practical,  not  a  doctrinal  em- 


32  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

blem, — that  it  is  a  Sign^  not  of  speculative  tenets, 
but  of  moral  power,  with  which  should  be  associat- 
ed in  the  soul  the  filial  trust,  the  unconquered  love, 
the  self-devotion  of  our  Lord.  The  Scriptural  usage, 
we  say,  leaves  it  in  no  doubt  that  these  were  the 
ideas  intended  to  be  awakened  by  the  symbol "  Christ 
crucified."  "  If  any  man  will  be  my  disciple,"  says 
our  Lord  himself,  "  let  him  take  up  his  cross,  and  fol- 
low me."  And  what  is  the  power  that,  in  the  very 
spirit  of  this  chapter,  St.  Paul  elsewhere  ascribes  to 
the  cross  of  Christ  ?  *  A  power  to  crucify  worldly 
affections,  and  for  God  and  the  Truth's  sake  to  rise 
superior  to  earthly  sufferings.  He  boasts  not  of 
knowledge,  —  he  pretends  to  no  revelation  of  hidden 
things,  —  he  possesses  only  a  practical  power  de- 
rived from  Christ  to  conquer  Evil :  —  "I  glory  only 
in  the  cross  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  by  whom  the 
world  is  crucified  unto  me,  and  I  unto  the  world." 

And  it  cannot  but  strike  us  as  very  extraordinary, 
that  these  words,  intended  by  St.  Paul  to  express 
that  he  attached  no  importance  to  any  thing  but 
moral  sympathy  with  the  Christ  of  God,  should 
now  be  cited  in  evidence  that  he  attached  no  impor- 
tance to  any  thing  but  certain  doctrinal  conceptions, 
—  that,  in  fact,  these  words  should  now  be  quoted 
in  support  of  a  speculative  conception  of  Christian- 
ity, which  was  the  very  conception  of  it  that  St. 
Paul  used  them  to  disclaim:  —  "  We  know  nothing 
but  Jesus  Christ,  and  him  crucified,"  say  a  certain 
class  of  preachers.     But  is  this  true  ?     Do  they  not 

*  Gal.  \i.  14. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  83 

pretend  to  know  a  vast  deal  more  ?  —  do  they  not 
connect  this  practical  power  and  victory  of  the 
Christ,  this  life  and  death  divine,  after  the  very  man- 
ner of  St  Paul's  Gnostics,  with  doubtful  specula- 
tions into  the  nature  and  origin  of  Evil,  —  with  pe- 
culiar views  of  the  metaphysical  essence  of  the  Dei- 
ty, —  with  philosophical  theories  as  to  how  God  can 
operate  on  a  human  mind  and  pardon  Sin  ?  —  and 
do  they  not,  out  of  all  these  speculative  elements, 
construct  a  System  in  which  they  find  a  place  for 
Christ  crucified,  —  a  system  which,  whether  true  or 
false,  is  nowhere  constructed  in  the  Scriptures,  and 
which  is  totally  foreign  to  the  genius  of  the  practi- 
cal Gospel  ?  St.  Paul,  to  avoid  divisions  on  merely 
intellectual  topics,  declared,  "  I  will  know  nothing, 
as  affecting  Christians,  but  the  moral  spirit  that  was 
in  the  life  and  death  of  Christ."  And  the  Preachers 
of  this  day,  in  direct  opposition,  declare  that  "  only 
to  know  this  is  to  know  nothing  " ;  for  that  "  Christ 
crucified  "  is  only  one  part  of  a  vast  system,  —  which 
system  arose  in  this  way :  —  that  there  is  an  Evil 
Being  in  eternal  conflict  with  God,  a  Dualism  in 
the  universe ;  that  this  Evil  Being  tempted  Adam  to 
sill ;  that  this  sin  impregnated  the  whole  of  his  race 
successively  with  the  spirit  of  the  Evil  One,  so  that 
the  Devil,  and  not  God,  is  henceforth  the  Father  of 
their  moral  natures  ;  that  God  was  willing  to  regen- 
erate fallen  man  with  a  new  spirit  from  himself,  and 
to  expel  the  Evil  One,  but  that  he  could  not  do  so 
in  consistency  with  his  Attributes,  for  his  Authority 
had  its  claims  as  well  as  his  Mercy,  until  some  ex- 
piation had  been  offered  to  him,  commensurate  with 


34  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

the  indignity  he  had  suffered  in  the  rebellion  of  his 
children ;  that,  to  meet  this  moral  necessity  of  God's 
nature,  there  were  in  his  essence  three  Infinite  Per- 
sons, and  that  one  of  these  Persons  was  willing  to 
suffer  in  the  place  of  men ;  that  an  infinite  indem- 
nity being  thus  provided  for  the  immeasurable  insult 
of  sin,  the  Austerity  of  God  no  longer  restrained  his 
Love,  and  his  sanctifying  Spirit  might  now  operate 
up^n  those  who,  by  thankfully  recognizing  the  sub- 
stituted expiation,  paid  this  tribute  to  his  violated 
Authority.  And,  Is  this  to  know  nothing  but  Christ 
the  crucified  ?  Is  not  this  to  leave  practical  religion, 
and  the  moral  spirit  of  the  Gospel,  for  the  sake  of 
that  very  speculative  theosophy,  those  theories  about 
God  and  the  origin  of  Evil,  against  which  St.  Paul 
so  earnestly  contends  as  destructive  of  the  simplicity 
of  the  Gospel  sentiment,  "  the  renewed  union  of  the 
heart  with  God  through  the  moral  attraction  of  his 
Christ "  ?  And  mark  how,  in  the  third  and  in  the 
following  verses  to  the  sixth,  St.  Paul  indicates  that 
it  was  a  moral  conviction,  a  spiritual  sentiment, 
which  he  had  labored  to  implant  in  the  deeper  heart 
of  this  speculative  and  light-minded  people.  Phi- 
losophy has  no  moral  anxiety  about  its  reception  in 
the  world,  —  it  produces  its  favorite  system,  or  sup- 
posed demonstration,  with  undisturbed  complacen- 
cy. The  Rhetorician  has  no  tremors  of  the  heart, 
no  moral  solicitude  as  to  whether  he  shall  touch  the 
springs  of  life  in  the  soul,  —  for  his  address  is  to  the 
fancy  and  to  the  passions.  But  St.  Paul,  with 
something  of  the  agony  of  his  Master  in  Gethsem- 
ane,   speaks   of  the   solicitudes  of  a   ministry  ad- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  35 

dressed  to  the  hearts  and  moral  affections  of  men  :  — 
"  And  I  was  with  you  with  none  of  the  confident 
pretensions  of  a  party  leader,  but  in  the  conscious- 
ness of  weakness,  in  holy  fear  and  trembling,  and 
my  preaching  was  not  directed  towards  speculative 
wisdom,  but  to  excite  within  you  the  workings  of 
that  better  spirit  which  is  akin  to  the  spirit  of  God, 
that  yom-  moral  acceptance  of  the  Christ  —  your 
faith  —  might  not  depend  on  the  wisdom  or  rhetori- 
cal power  of  man,  but,  proceeding  from  the  divine 
affections  of  your  nature,  should  be  founded  on  the 
persuasive  power  of  God's  spirit  within  you." 

The  remainder  of  the  chapter,  from  the  sixth 
verse,  is  a  demonstration  that  Christianity,  as  a 
purely  spiritual  sentiment,  is  addressed  only  to  the 
spiritual  affections  of  man,  —  is  understood  only  by 
that  man  who  has  in  him  some  portion  of  God's 
spirit,  —  and  that,  being  thus  addressed  to  the  di- 
vinest  element  of  the  soul,  to  that  spiritual  con- 
science which  knows  no  reasonings^  but  is  the  imme- 
diate voice  of  God,  it  can  be  made  a  source  of  Di- 
visions only  when  it  is  seized  upon,  as  it  were,  from 
without,  by  the  faculties  that  are  not  spiritual,  —  by 
the  speculative  ones  that  lead  to  System-building, 
or  by  the  imaginative  and  sensuous  ones  that  lead 
to  the  exaltation  of  outward  Forms.  I  will  attempt 
to  convey  the  meaning  that  is  contained  in  the  pas- 
sage from  the  sixth  to  the  end  of  the  tenth  verse. 
"  Although  Christianity  is  not  of  the  nature  of  spec- 
ulative knowledge,  yet  to  those  who  are  spiritual  it 
is  the  divinest  wisdom,  —  not,  indeed,  the  wisdom  of 
men  of  the  world,  nor  of  the  intellectual  Leaders  of 


36  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

the  world,  whose  rule  will  be  swept  away  before  its 
power,  —  but  a  wisdom  hitherto  unknown  to  the 
world,  and  now,  in  the  fulness  of  time,  revealed  by- 
God  to  those  who  are  of  a  spiritual  mind, —  a  divine 
wisdom  which  the  Leaders  of  the  world  had  no  per- 
ception of,  for  had  they  anticipated  or  sympathized 
with  it,  they  would  not  have  rejected  the  Lord  who 
brought  it ;  —  as  it  is  written,  '  Eye  did  not  see,  and 
ear  did  not  hear,  and  it  did  not  enter  into  the  heart 
of  man  to  preconceive  the  revelations  that  God  de- 
signed for  all  who  love  him.'  But  these  revelations 
God  has  now  made  to  our  spiritual  nature,  —  for  it 
is  only  through  that  portion  of  his  Spirit  which  he 
has  communicated  to  ours,  that  we  are  enabled  to 
enter  into  these  deeps  of  God."  The  argument  of 
St.  Paul  in  this  passage  is  simply  this :  —  that  Chris- 
tianity, as  not  addressed  to  the  speculative  faculties, 
but  as  an  immediate  revelation  to  the  diviner  ele- 
ment in  man,  cannot  be  the  subject  of  argumenta- 
tive divisions,  for  that  it  is  accepted  only  by  that 
portion  of  the  Spirit  of  God  which  is  in  a  man,  rec- 
ognizing the  same  spirit  dwelling  without  measure 
in  Christ.  Our  translation  in  the  tenth  verse  says, 
that  God  has  revealed  Christianity  unto  us  by  his 
Spirit.  But  this,  though  true,  may  not  give  the 
true  import, — which  is,  that  God  has  made  the  rev- 
elation to  the  spirit;  not  to  the  discursive  or  argu- 
mentative faculties,  but  to  that  higher  principle  in 
man  which  receives  Jesus  as  from  God,  and  rests  in 
the  sublime  faith  of  a  moral  certainty,  because  the 
immediate  oracles  of  God  within  the  soul  are  found 
in  harmony  with,  and  bear  witness  to,  the  oracles 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  37 

of  God  in  Christianity.  This  is  the  true  source  of 
Christian  faith,  —  when  the  heavenly  spirit  that  is 
in  a  man  is  thrilled  and  exalted  by  the  greater  ful- 
ness of  the  same  spirit  which  is  in  Christ.  No  man 
who  has  not  felt  this  is  in  any  deep  sense  a  Chris- 
tian. His  Faith  stands  not  in  the  spirit  and  the 
power  of  God.  And  no  man  who  has  felt  it  can 
be  in  any  doubt  as  to  what  constitutes  Christianity. 
No  man,  proceeds  St.  Paul,  can  know  God,  ex- 
cept so  far  as  he  has  some  portion  of  God's  spirit  in 
him ;  for  as  no  man  knoweth  the  things  of  a  man, 
except  the  spirit  of  the  man,  that  is  in  him,  —  so  no 
man  knoweth  the  things  of  God,  except  so  far  as 
he  has  something  of  the  spirit  of  God :  "  Now  we 
Christians,  in  so  far  as  we  are  morally  united  with 
Christ,  do  not  look  with  the  dubious  sight  of  world- 
ly wisdom,  — but  have  received  of  the  spirit  of  God, 
that  we  might  know,  not  speculatively,  but  by  spir- 
itual discernment,  his  free  gifts  in  Christ;  and  we 
speak  of  these  things  not  in  words  borrowed  from 
speculative  philosophy,  but  in  words  borrowed  from 
the  spiritual  nature,  —  explaining  spiritual  things  in 
a  spiritual  way  "  ;  or,  possibly,  "  interpreting  spiritu- 
al things  to  the  spiritual."  Our  English  version 
renders  the  last  clause  of  the  13th  verse,  "  compar- 
ing spiritual  things  with  spiritual,"  which  is  not  only 
of  very  doubtful  meaning,  but  suggests  no  meaning 
at  all  that  seems  suited  to  the  context.  St.  Paul 
meant  to  express,  that  neither  in  the  discernment 
of  spiritual  things,  which  is  the  immediate  act  of  a 
spiritual  nature,  —  "the  pure  in  heart  see  God,"  — 
nor  in  the  method  of  communicating  them,  which 

4 


88  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

is  simply  by  presenting  them  for  the  spontaneous 
attraction  of  the  spiritual  faculty,  could  faction  or 
schism  find  a  place.  The  doctrine  that  pervades 
this  whole  argument  of  St.  Paul,  and  of  which  every 
religious  man  must  have  had  experience,  is,  that  there 
is  a  divine  element  in  the  human  soul,  an  intuitive 
spirit,  which,  when  kept  pure  and  exercised,  and  not 
clogged  or  dimmed  by  sinful  passions,  recognizes 
kindred  goodness  by  a  divine  affinity,  and  is  the 
immediate  revealer  of  God.  You  will  observe  how, 
in  the  14th  and  15th  verses,  he  speaks  of  the  "  ani- 
mal man  "  and  of  the  "  spiritual  man  " ;  —  by  the  one, 
meaning  the  worldly  understanding,  —  the  earthly 
mind,  taste,  sensibilities,  and  passions,  —  and  by  the 
other,  the  estimates  and  discernments  of  the  diviner 
mind,  —  of  the  spirit  that  reveals  God.  Among  the 
writers  and  philosophers  of  St.  Paul's  age  there  was 
a  well-known  division  of  the  whole  nature  of  man 
into  the  flesh,  the  soul,  and  the  spirit.  The  Flesh 
was  the  bodily  nature  with  all  the  desires  and  ten- 
dencies that  arise  out  of  it ;  the  Soul  was  the  com- 
mon understanding,  the  judgment,  the  aesthetical 
and  the  logical  faculties,  applied  to  the  various  sub- 
jects with  which  mere  Sense  and  Intellect  are  con- 
versant; the  Spirit  was  transcendental,  —  that  por- 
tion of  man's  nature  properly  divine ;  —  it  had  an 
inward  intuition  of  God.  The  spirit  was  the  voice 
and  prompting  of  God  within  us.  It  could  have  no 
connection  with  evil,  and  nothing  evil  could  proceed 
from  it ;  but  by  the  predominance  of  the  senses,  and 
of  the  lower  powers  of  the  soul,  its  activity  could  be 
depressed,  or  altogether  suspended.     "  The  Fathers," 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II. 


39 


says.  Neander,  "  instead  of  endeavoring  to  prove  the 
existence  of  God  by  logical  inference,  appealed  to 
that  which  is   most  immediate  in  the  human  spirit, 
and  is  antecedent  to   all  proof.     They  appealed  to 
the  originally  implanted  consciousness  of  God  which 
human  nature  cannot  deny.     They  appealed  to  an 
original  revelation  of  the  One  God,  made  to  the  hu- 
man spirit,  on  which  every  other  revelation  of  God 
is  founded.     Clement  appealed  to  the  fact,  that  every 
scientific  proof  presupposes  something  which  is  not 
proved,  which  can  be    conceived   only   through   an 
immediate  agency  on  the  spirit  of  man.     To  the  Su- 
preme Being  —  the  Being  elevated  above  all  matter 
—  faith  alone  can  raise  itself.     There  can  be  any 
knowledge   or   perception   of   God,   only  in    as   far 
as   he   himself  has  revealed  himself  to  man.     God 
cannot   be   conceived   by    means    of  demonstrative 
knowledge,  for  this  proceeds  only  from  things  previ- 
ously acknowledged,  and  from  the  more  known  to 
other  things  that  are  less  known ;   but  nothing  in 
this  way  can  be  a  prior  premise  in  which  the  Eter- 
nal is  included  ;  and  it  is  only  by  Divine  grace,  and 
by  the  revelation  of  his  eternal  Word,  that  we  can 
recognize  the  unknown   God."*     There  is  another 
passage  from  one  of  the  Fathers,  given  by  Neander, 
which  illustrates  what  St.  Paul  here  intended  by  im- 
mediate revelations  to  the  spiritual  element  in  man : 
—  "  Just  as  the  tarnished  mirror  will  not  receive  an 
image,  so  the  unclean  soul  cannot  receive  the  image 

*  "  The  Training  and  Tlanting  of  the  Christian  Church."  —  Cabinet 
Library. 


40  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

of  God.  But  God  has  created  all  things  in  order 
that  he  may  be  known  by  his  works,  just  as  the 
invisible  soul  is  known  by  its  operations.  All  life 
reveals  him;  his  breath  animates  all  things;  with- 
out him  all  would  again  sink  back  into  nothing- 
ness; man  cannot  speak  without  revealing  him, 
and  only  in  the  darkening  of  his  own  soul  lies  the 
cause  of  his  being  unable  to  perceive  this  revelation. 
He  says,  therefore,  to  man.  Give  thyself  to  the  physi- 
cian who  is  able  to  heal  the  eyes  of  thy  soul ;  give 
thyself  to  God." 

Again,  to  show  the  connection  of  all  this  with 
that  subject  of  which  St.  Paul  never  for  a  moment 
loses  sight:  how  can  Christian  unity  be  violated  in 
relation  to  things  which  are  only  spiritually  dis- 
cerned? With  these  things  the  discursive  and  spec- 
ulative faculties,  which  present  various  views,  and 
create  divisions,  are  not  concerned ;  only  the  holy 
heart  that  is  kept  pure  for  God,  only  the  divine  eye 
of  the  mind,  perceives  them  ;  and  since  it  is  God's 
spirit  in  us  that  makes  us  capable  of  discerning 
God,  a  moral  sentiment  of  the  Godlike  in  Christ 
must  be  the  same  in  all  souls,  and  the  Divine  Image 
in  our  Lord  can  leave  but  one  impression  on  the 
hearts  that  are  capable  of  taking  the  imprint. 

And  so,  when  we  reach  to  any  personal  commun- 
ion with  God  and  Christ,  to  the  deep  utterances  of 
the  spiritual  nature,  controversy  disappears.  Our 
differences  all  arise  out  of  our  logical  and  argumen- 
tative faculties ;  but  the  revelations  of  the  Spirit, 
that  which  the  diviner  mind  approves,  are  in  fact  not 
ours  as  individuals,  —  they  are  derived  from  the  spirit 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    II.  41 

of  our  Father  who  is  in  us,  and  in  all  men  they  are 
the  same.  Within  that  Holy  of  Holies,  where  the 
spirit  alone  speaks,  where,  beneath  all  the  errors  and 
mistakes  of  feeble  reason,  there  flow  from  a  divine 
source,  in  the  deep  wells  of  the  soul,  the  living  wa- 
ters of  Conscience,  —  in  that  religious  shrine  of  our 
nature,  whenever  they  penetrate  to  it,  there  is  har- 
mony among  all  men.  From  this  centre  of  com- 
munion with  God,  and  from  this  alone,  can  the 
mind  rightly  discern  the  system  which  Providence 
has  spread  around  it,  and  the  attitudes  of  things ; 
and  the  spirit  that  lives  in  communion  with  God 
cannot  be  judged,  cannot  be  known,  by  the  worldly 
mind.*  In  itself  is  the  Holy  Spirit,  which  no  one  can 
know,  except  those  who  have  it,  —  and  they  are  one 
fomily  in  God.  "  Now  we  Christians,"  says  St.  Paul, 
"inasmuch  as  we  are  Christians,  have  this  spirit, 
for  it  is  the  spirit  that  dwelt  in  Christ." 

With  regard  to  this  divine  element  in  Man, 
which  is  the  principle  to  which  all  Religion  is  ad- 
dressed, —  which  is  the  source  of  immediate  revela- 
tions in  every  holy  heart  unstained  by  sin,  —  which 
recognizes  God  in  his  works,  not  by  a  logical,  but 
by  a  moral  or  kindred  perception,  and  which,  by  the 
divine  attraction  of  the  Image  of  God  in  Christ  held 
before  it,  may  be  lifted  to  holier  and  diviner  revela- 
tions than  the  unassisted  spirit  could  have  reached, 
— - 1  entreat  you  to  remember  that  I  am  not  offering 
to  you  views  of  my  own,  —  that  if  I  have  but  right- 
ly read  him,  St.  Paul  is  their  Preacher. 


ii.  15. 


42  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

I  entertain,  indeed,  a  profound  conviction  of  their 
truth,  —  and  that  this  is  the  only  view  of  Man  that 
does  justice  to  the  glorious  nature  that  God  has 
given  us,  and  that  appeals  with  fitting  power  to  the 
divine  affinities,  to  the  solemn  responsibilities,  of 
children  of  God.  One  thing  is  obvious,  in  consis- 
tency with  St.  Paul's  use  of  them  in  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  inviolable  nature  of  Christian  unity,  — 
that  only  from  the  rejection  of  these  views,  from 
substituting  a  speculative  orthodoxy  for  a  spiritual 
discernment,  are  still  derived  all  the  seeds  of  relig- 
ious strife. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  43 


SECTION  III, 


DISSENSIONS,  ARISING  FROM    THE  PRETENSIONS  AND   VULGAR 
PASSIONS  OF  INDIVIDUALS. 


CHAP.   III.   1-23. 


1  And  I,  brethren,  could  not  speak  to  you  as  to  spiritual 

2  men,  but  as  to  carnal, —  as  to  babes  in  Christ.  I  fed 
you   with  milk,   not   with   meat,   for    not  yet   were   ye 

3  able,  nor  even  now  are  ye  able,  to  bear  it.  For  still 
ye  are  carnal :  for  since  there  is  among  you  envying, 
and  strife,   and    divisions,   are   ye   not   carnal,  walking 

4  after  the  fashion  of  men  .?  For  while  one  sailh,  "  I 
am  of  Paul,"  and  another,  "  I  am  of  ApoUos,"   are  ye 

5  not  carnal  ?  Who  then  is  Paul,  and  who  is  Apollos  ? 
Ministers    through    whom    ye    believed,    even    as   the 

6  Lord  gave  to   each.     I  have  planted  :    Apollos  watered  : 

7  but  God  gave  the  increase.  So  that  neither  he  that 
planteth  is  any  thing,  nor  he  that  watereth,  —  but  God 

8  that  giveth  the  increase.  Now  he  that  planteth  and 
he    that  watereth   are   one ;  and  each   shall  receive  his 

9  own  reward  according  to  his  own  labor.  For  we  are 
God's  fellow-laborers :   ye   are  God's   husbandry,  God's 

10  building.  A^ccording  to  the  grace  of  God  given  unto 
me,  as  a  wise  master-builder  I  laid  the  foundation,  and 
another  buildeth   up  :  but  let   each   take   heed  how  he 

11  buildeth   up.     For  another  foundation   can   no  man   lay 


44  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

in   addition    to   that   which   is   laid,    which   is  Jesus  the 
Christ. 

12  Now   if    any    one   build   upon   this   foundation,   gold, 

13  silver,  precious  stones,  —  wood,  hay,  stubble,  —  the  work 
of  each  will  be  made  manifest,  for  the  day  [time]  will 
declare   it,    because  it   is  revealed  in  fire,   and   the  fire 

14  shall  try  every  man's  work,  of  what  sort  it  is.  If 
any    one's    work    which    he    hath    built    up     endure,  he 

15  shall  receive  a  reward.  If  any  man's  work  shall  be 
burnt,  he  shall  suffer  the  loss  ;  but  he  himself  shall  be 

16  saved,  yet  so  as  through  fire.  Know  ye  not  that  ye 
are   the    temple   of    God,   and    that   the    spirit  of    God 

17  dwelleth  in  you  ?  If  any  man  defile  the  temple  of  God, 
him    shall  God  defile  :    for  the  temple  of   God  is   holy, 

18  which  be  ye.  Let  no  one  deceive  himself:  If  any  one 
among    you    seem   to    be    wise    in    this    world,    let    him 

19  become  a  fool  that  he  may  be  wise.  For  the  wisdom 
of  this  world  is  foolishness  with  God,    for  it  is  written, 

20  "  He  taketh  the  wise  in  their  own  craftiness."  *  And 
again,      "  The    Lord   knoweth   the   calculations   of  the 

21  wise,    that    they   are    vain."  t     Wherefore   let    no   man 

22  glory  in  men,  for  All  Things  are  yours.  Whether  Paul, 
or  Apollos,  or  Cephas,  or  the  world,  or  life,  or  death,  or 

23  things  present,  or  things  to  come.  All  are  yours ;  but 
ye  are  Christ's,  and  Christ  is  God's. 


The  worst  sources  of  Party  spirit  in  Religion  are 
the  passions,  the  pride,  the  self-importance,  of  In- 
dividuals. Li  the  peculiar  language  employed  by 
St.  Paul,  these  are  connected,  not  with  the    natural 

*  Job  V.  13.  t  Ps.  xciv.  11. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  45 

man,  but  with  the  carnal  man ;  they  have  their  ori- 
gin not  in  the  errors,  insufficiencies,  or  an'ogance 
of  mere  intellect,  but  in  the  vanities,  the  jealousies, 
the  intruding  pretensions,  the  lowness  and  vulgarity, 
of  the  sensual  nature.  Their  source  is  not  in  the 
Thoughts,  but  in  the  passions :  they  are  not  errors, 
but  vices.  St.  Paul,  as  we  have  observed,  points  at 
the  existence  of  a  threefold  nature  in  man ;  one  of 
which  is  peculiarly  the  religious  faculty,  —  whilst 
the  others,  whenever  they  presume  to  impress  them- 
selves on  Christianity,  and  to  mould  it  after  their 
own  tendencies,  become  the  sources  of  divisions,  in- 
tolerance, bigotry,  mere  human  partisanship,  and 
all  the  rest  of  the  practical  religious  evils.  In  a 
broad  and  general  way  we  may  comprehend  this 
triple  nature  under  the  heads  of  the  Sensual  or 
carnal  man,  —  the  Intellectual  or  animal  man,  —  and 
the  Religious  or  spiritual  man.  Every  man  is  a 
compound  of  these  three,  and  the  moral  question  is, 
Which  predominates,  and  subordinates  the  rest? 
There  is  order  in  the  individual  mind,  and  peace 
in  the  Church,  only  when  the  spiritual  faculty,  the 
recognized  oracle  and  vicegerent  of  God,  is  the  es- 
sential leader,  —  and  when  the  dictates  of  specula- 
tion or  corporeal  feeling,  however  innocent  or  ser- 
viceable, as  accessories,  to  the  Individual,  are  never 
suffered  to  become  leading  principles  in  the  mind, 
or  to  \q,j  foundations  in  the  Church.  In  our  English 
translation  these  three  elements  in  man  are  dis- 
tinguished, as  the  carnal  man,  the  natural  man,  and 
the  spiritual  man.  It  may  perhaps  place  many  in 
a  position  to  form  an  independent  judgment  as  to 


46  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

what  St.  Paul  understood  by  this  so-called  natural 
man,  to  mention  that  it  is  the  same  conception,  and 
the  same  word,  as  the  Psyche  of  the  Greeks.  From 
the  utterly  indefensible  and  misleading  use  which 
polemics  make  of  the  expression,  "  natural  man, " 
in  our  translation,  no  one  could  suppose  that  it  re- 
lated to  those  parts  of  Man  —  the  passions,  loves, 
thoughts,  and  sensibilities  of  the  earthly  mind  — 
which  correspond  with  this  impersonation  of  My- 
thology. By  confounding  the  "  natural  man  "  with 
the  "  carnal  man,"  and  by  representing  that  the 
"  spiritual  man "  is  not  an  original  element  in 
our  nature,  but  a  distinct  endowment,  like  a  new 
sense,  of  supernatural  Grace  acting  arbitrarily, 
our  orthodox  theologians  have  removed  St.  Paul's 
conceptions  of  Man  and  Christianity,  and  substi- 
tuted their  own  System.  Our  last  chapter  was 
occupied  with  the  divisions  which  arise  from  the 
speculative  tendencies,  presuming  to  lay  founda- 
tions and  prescribe  essentials  in  Christianity ;  —  the 
present  chapter  is  chiefly  occupied  with  the  meaner 
strife  of  personal  pretensions,  —  with  the  vulgar  am- 
bition of  Leadership  in  the  Church,  which  has  its 
main  roots  in  the  animal  man,  in  the  carnal  envies 
and  passions. 

In  Religion  we  may  distinguish  the  End,  which 
is  the  filial  relation  of  the  soul  to  God,  from  the 
Means,  which  are  the  agencies,  of  every  kind,  —  mor- 
al, intellectual,  liturgical,  ceremonial,  rhetorical,  or 
imaginative  and  artistical,  —  by  which  the  Church, 
for  religious  purposes,  has  sought  to  address  and 
influence  the  nature  of  Man.     Now  here,  as  in  all 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  47 

the  other  concerns  of  man,  a  livelier  interest  may 
improperly  attach  to  the  means  than  to  the  end ;  so 
that  the  Church,  the  outward  instrumentality  and 
appliances,  may  really  attract  to  itself  all  the  sym- 
pathies and  feelings  which  ought  to  be  devoted, 
and  indeed  are  supposed  to  be  devoted,  to  the  re- 
ligious relations  of  the  soul.  There  is  hardly  any 
thing  connected  with  himself,  which  a  man,  so 
disposed,  cannot  make  a  source  of  personal  impor- 
tance. It  is  in  this  way  that  the  carnal  element 
defiles  Religion.  The  rank  and  standing  of  a  con- 
gregation, the  numbers  and  even  the  wealth  of  its 
members,  the  fulness  and  solemnity,  or  the  poverty 
and  bareness,  of  its  outward  worship,  the  compara- 
tive gifts  of  its  minister,  nay,  the  rival  claims  of  the 
very  Building,  are  all  matters  on  which  keen  feelings 
can  be  excited,  and  partisanship  exist,  whilst  Relig- 
ion is  made  the  mere  occasion  of  these  low  interests. 
Of  this  nature  are  the  pretensions  of  a  sacred  order, 
the  claims  of  superiority  on  the  part  of  Establish- 
ments, the  emasculated  character  of  the  spiritual 
leaders  of  what  calls  itself  the  religious  world  by 
privilege  of  official  rank,  —  and,  what  perhaps  is 
more  offensive  still,  the  official  importance  of  the 
ruling  members  in  some  dissenting  communities, 
who  sit  in  conclave  on  the  rights  of  church-member- 
ship and  issue  permission  to  their  fellow- Christians 
to  attend  the  Lord's  Supper.  It  is  instructive  to  ob- 
serve, and  a  warning  that  will  be  despised  by  none 
who  know  the  human  heart,  over  what  an  extent  of 
foreign  objects  such  men  can  swell  their  individ- 
uality, appropriating  to  themselves  the  genius  of  a 


48  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

preacher,  the  splendors  of  an  edifice,  the  prosperity 
of  a  Church,  —  converting  all  these  into  sources  of 
self-importance,  whilst  Religion  is  the  mask  under 
which  these  low  passions  find  their  gratification,  and 
can  exist  without  detection.  The  Roman  Catholics 
and  the  Methodists  recognized  these  carnalities,  and 
acutely  turned  them  to  account.  They  made  a 
place  for  the  gratification  of  individual  importance, 
—  they  used  it  to  build  up  a  Church,  —  as  the 
Prophet  complains,  "  calling  in  the  Syrians  to  serve 
the  Lord." 

The  only  way  to  destroy  the  roots  of  Party  spirit 
in  religion  is  to  regard  the  great  end  —  the  relation 
of  the  soul  to  God  —  as  alone  essential,  and  the  in- 
struments as  utterly  indifferent,  provided  only  they 
are  effectual ;  for  then  would  the  interests  and  the 
efforts  of  each  mind  fasten  upon  that  which  is  uni- 
versal in  Christianity,  and  all  the  diversities  of  ad- 
ministration be  but  the  special  means  best  fitted  to 
the  individual,  conducting  the  free  mind  to  the  same 
God.  "  There  are  diversities  of  gifts,  but  the  same 
spirit.  And  there  are  differences  of  administration, 
but  the  same  Lord.  And  there  are  diversities  of  op- 
eration, but  it  is  the  same  God  which  worketh  all  in 
all."  At  the  same  time  we  ought  to  be  aware  that 
freedom  from  Party  spirit  in  Religion  is  not  an  easy 
virtue,  and  that  nothing  but  the  purest  and  most  ear- 
nest interest  in  the  spiritual  reality  can  save  us  from 
attaching  a  lower  class  of  interests  to  the  instru- 
ments and  the  accessories.  "  I  was  not  able,"  says 
St.  Paul  to  the  Corinthians,  "  to  speak  unto  you  as 
unto  spiritual,  but  as  unto  carnal,  even  as  unto  mi- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  49 

nors  in  Christ."  The  spiritual  interest,  the  relation 
to  God  revealed  in  Christ,  was  not  supreme  and 
exclusive  of  every  other;  —  the  passions  were  not 
stilled  in  the  intense  life  of  the  soul ;  the  commun- 
ion with  Heaven  did  not  preclude  all  earthly  alter- 
cations ;  even  within  the  sphere  of  Religion,  the  car- 
nal nature  could  not  contest  with  the  spiritual  the 
occupation  of  the  heart,  and  find  food  for  its  gratifi- 
cation and  occasions  for  its  exercise.  Those  whose 
humble  and  supreme  desire  it  was  to  feel  the  pres- 
ence of  God  in  the  Temple  of  the  spirit,  and  to  find 
in  Christ  a  divine  light  and  guidance  for  the  soul, 
could  not  merge  these  spiritual  affections  in  the  vul- 
gar strife  of  Leadership,  in  the  rival  pretensions  of 
distinguished  Teachers.  It  is  only  among  minds 
not  engaged  with  the  highest  and  purest  sources  of 
life  and  peace,  —  not  lifted  above  the  lower  faculties, 
that  Dissensions  can  arise,  or  Party  spirit  find  a 
place.  Those  who  truly  seek  to  be  one  with  God 
and  with  his  Christ,  do  not  breathe  in  the  element 
of  partisanship.  "  Whereas  there  is  among  you 
envying,  and  strife,  and  divisions,  are  ye  not  carnal, 
and  walk  as  men  ?  do  ye  not  walk  with  a  view  to 
man's  glory  and  pretensions,  instead  of  centring  all 
in  God?  For  while  one  saith,  '  I  am  of  Paul,'  and 
another,  '  I  am  of  Apollos,'  are  ye  not  carnal  ?  "  Is 
not  this  to  have  w^orldly  contentions  on  holy  ground, 

—  to  call  the  commonest  passions  a  zeal  for  Religion, 

—  and  to  forget,  through  the  hot  interest  arising  out 
of  enlisted  passions,  that  the  whole  Church  has  but 
one  spiritual  aim,  and  seeks,  through  the  guidance  of 
Christ,  to  be  of  God  alone  ? 


50  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

There  were  at  Corinth  —  and  until  Christianity 
effectually  realizes  in  the  world  the  reign  of  God, 
there  must  always  be  —  men  belonging  to  a  Church, 
and  even  passionately  pledged  to  some  of  its  inter- 
ests, who  yet  do   not  find  their  chief  attraction  to 
it  to  be  connected  with  the  quiet  nourishment  of  the 
inward  life,  —  with  the  improvement  and  exercise  of 
the  spiritual  nature.     In  such  cases,  when  the  true 
bond  does  not  exist,  —  when  the  soul  does  not  seek, 
in  the  simplicity  of  its  affections,  subjection  and  dis- 
cipleship  to  Christ,  the  branch  must  either  drop  off 
from  the  vine,  or   some   outward   ligament   supply 
the  place  of  the  living  and  organic  connection ;  and 
the  flame  of  zeal,  if  it  burns  at  all,  must  derive  its 
heat  from  some  other  source  than  the  "baptism  by 
fire."       Such   men   are   the   worldly   leaven    of  the 
Church,  —  its  tempters  and   corrupters.      They  are 
worse  than  all  external  enemies,  for  they  introduce 
the  poison  and  agitation  of  low  passions  within  its 
own  bosom.     They  live  upon  coarse  excitements,  — 
they  fasten  with  a  carnal  eagerness  on  some  merely 
outward   and   instrumental   interest,  —  they   stir   in 
other  hearts  the  party  spirit  always  too  ready  to  be 
excited,  that  yet  might  have  slept  if  the  more  elevat- 
ed soul  had  not  been  rudely  called  away  from  deep- 
er thoughts.     Their  element  is  external  and  super- 
ficial ;  they  require  stimulants  addressed  to  the  carnal 
and  the  natural   man,  —  and  they  foster  whatever 
in  the  administration  of  Religion  may  be  connected 
with   the   importance    of  individuals,   or   with    the 
vanity  and  ambition  of  Churches.     The  unspiritual 
Corinthians   fed   their  zeal   by  disputing  the  rival 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  51 

qualifications  of  the  principal  Teachers  of  Chris- 
tianity. The  ambition  of  Leadership  does  not 
always  originate  with  the  Leaders:  they  are  often 
tempted  into  it  by  the  stimulants,  and  low-minded- 
ness,  of  those  who.  have  no  more  spiritual  source  of 
interest  in  Religion.  Mankind  are  willing  to  be  led, 
are  willing  to  have  an  Idol,  and  they  are  not  dis- 
pleased to  believe  that  the  lower  interest  of  party, 
or  personal  excitement,  is  a  true  spiritual  zeal.  As 
Churches  are  constituted,  and  as  the  human  heart 
is  constituted,  when  the  elements  of  ambition  which 
every  nature  supplies  are  assailed  by  the  very  cir- 
cumstances of  temptation,  —  when  the  weakest  part 
of  man  is  purposely  heated, — when,  under  the  guise 
of  spiritual  power  exerted  in  the  highest  services  that 
man  can  render  man,  undue  self-love  is  studiously 
inflamed,  —  who  can  wonder  that  minds,  originally 
sincere  and  pure,  have  fallen  under  stimulants  so 
coarsely  administered?  —  and  why  should  the  am- 
bition and  miserable  weakness  of  Church  Leaders 
be  more  remembered,  than  the  carnality  and  vulgar- 
mindedness  of  the  Churches  that  corrupted  them  ? 
It  is  not  Apollos,  nor  Peter,  nor  himself,  that  St. 
Paul  blames,  but  the  unspiritual  Corinthians,  who, 
having  no  purer  interest,  must  have  the  carnal  ex- 
citement of  party  Leaders,  even  within  the  bosom  of 
the  same  Church.  In  these  times  of  religious  fever, 
it  requires  some  nobleness  of  nature  in  any  gifted 
mind  not  to  prostitute  its  high  powers  to  the  pur- 
poses of  self-distinction,  —  of  a  superficial  *and  per- 
nicious popularity  ;  —  and  Christian  congregations 
of  this  day,  no  more  than  the  Corinthians  of  St.  Paul, 


52  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

are  free  from  vulgarity  and  carnal-mindedness,  if 
they  minister  to  the  self-importance  of  individuals, 
court  Leaderships,  and  tempt  the  lower  passions  of 
men. 

In  the  passage  from  the  5th  to  the  9th  verse, 
St.  Paul  exposes  the  carnal  character  of  Party  spirit, 
by  the  consideration,  that  the  Faith  of  the  Soul,  the 
confidence  and  repose  of  the  moral  being  in  relation 
to  God,  was  the  aim  and  rest  of  the  Christian ;  and 
that  to  allow  the  soul  to  fall  from  this  high  desire 
to  such  unchristian  work  as  a  schi-smatical  adherence 
to  rival  Teachers  of  the  same  truth,  was  in  fact  to 
derive  their  chief  interest  in  Religion  from  low  and 
passionate  affections.  "  Who  is  Paul,  and  who  is 
Apollos,  but  ministers  by  whom  ye  were  led  to  the 
supreme  rest  of  the  spirit,  to  faith  and  trust  in  God, 
with  such  success  as  God  gave  to  each  of  them  ? 
Shall  your  spirits  forget  the  supreme  End,  that  your 
passions  may  centre  on  the  human  means  ?  The 
agents  by  which  God  works  are,  as  to  their  officers, 
all  alike  in  honor,  —  and  the  only  distinction  be- 
tween them  is  in  the  fidelity  with  which  they  work ; 
—  in  that  relation  alone  does  God  make  a  difference 
between  his  servants, — rewarding  each,  not  accord- 
ing to  his  office^  but  according  to  his  faithfulness 
and  labor.  But  God,  through  his  instruments,  is 
the  supreme  Teacher  and  Light  of  the  soul.  Ye  are 
carnal  if  ye  stop  short  of  him ;  and  if  ye  all  rest  in 
him,  how  can  ye  be  divided  ?  Ye  are  God^s  hus- 
bandry, -^  ye  are  God^s  building ;  —  why  range  your- 
selves under  the  servants  he  employs  ?  " 

With  respect  to  the  peculiarities  of  opinion  which 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  53 

the  rival  sects  of  Corinth  elevated  into  Heresies,  — 
that  is,  sources  of  schism  and  contention,  —  St.  Paul 
next  lays  down  the  doctrine,  that  there  is  but  one 
thing  fundamental  in  Christianity,  namely,  that  Je- 
sus is  the  Christ,  the  Leader  up  to  God,  the  moral 
Lord  and  Master  of  the  soul.  If  any  man  declares, 
that,  in  addition  to  this,  something  else  is  funda- 
mental and  essential,  —  then  that  man  takes  upon 
himself  to  preach  a  new  Gospel ;  —  but  God's  Gos- 
pel is,  that  men  will  be  saved  if  they  take  his  Christ 
as  their  guide.  This  is  the  literal  meaning  of  the 
11th  verse :  "  Other  Foundation  can  no  man  lay,  in 
addition  to  that  which  is  laid,  namely,  Jesus  as  the 
Christ,''^  the  moral  Leader  of  the  soul.  The  sec- 
taries at  Corinth  did  not  reject  Jesus  as  the  Christ, 
but  along  with  this,  the  only  fundamental,  they 
wished  to  connect  some  peculiarity  of  their  own  as 
equally  fundamental.  Such  peculiarities,  St.  Paul 
declares,  provided  they  are  not  taught  so  as  to  in- 
terfere with  the  only  foundation,  or  to  add  to  it,  had 
better  be  left  to  the  action  of  Time ;  —  the  Day  shall 
test  them,  for  it  will  place  them  in  the  burning  focus 
of  the  universal  mind,  enlightened  continually  by 
God's  truth.  If  these  secondary  views  are  in  har- 
mony with  the  Foundation,  —  if  they  are  of  the  gold 
and  precious  metal  of  the  soul,  —  they  will  stand 
the  fiery  test,  and  they  will  remain,  eternal  posses- 
sions to  the  Christian  mind;  —  but  if  they  are  mere 
fancies,  dross  and  stubble,  they  shall  be  burned  up 
by  the  searching  fire  of  Truth.  » Yet  the  man  him- 
self shall  be  saved,  provided  he  has  not  lost  sight  of 
the  fundamental  truth  that  Jesus  is  his  moral  Lord, 


54  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

—  though,  since  his  favorite  theories  and  systems 
will  burn  like  wood  and  hay,  his  salvation,  if  he  has 
consumed  time,  and  thought,  and  zeal  in  over  devo- 
tion to  such  non-essentials,  may  be  as  a  rescue  from 
the  flames,  and  not  without  scathe. 

I  mention  it  as  a  curious  fact  in  the  morbid  Anat- 
omy of  religion,  and  as  showing  the  appetite  for 
horrors  engendered  by  systems,  that  there  is  a  class 
of  interpreters,  who,  finding  the  last  clause,  as  now 
expounded,  too  merciful  for  their  theology,  which 
would  require  that  the  man  himself  should  be  burned 
up  along  with  the  false  views  which  he  had  added  to 
the  true  Foundation,  propose  to  translate  in  this 
way :  "  If  any  man's  work  shall  not  bear  the  force 
of  the  fire,  he  shall  suffer  its  loss,  —  but  he  himself 
shall  be  reserved^  as  one  kept  for  fire,  to  be  burned 
for  ever." 

From  the  16th  verse  to  the  close  of  the  chapter, 
there  is  introduced  a  sublime  view  of  the  relation  of 
the  Soul  to  the  vast  system  of  Providence  which  is 
spread  around  us,  and  to  the  Infinite  Father,  who 
employs  these  influences  not  as  ends  in  which  his 
children  are  to  rest,  but  as  means  to  conduct  them  to 
himself.  The  spiritual  Church  is  his  temple:  his 
spirit  reigns  in  every  member  of  it,  —  and  not  to  be 
of  that  unity  is  to  detach  one's  self  from  the  spirit- 
ual building.  "  Know  ye  not  that  ye  are  the  temple 
of  God,  and  that  the  spirit  of  God  dwelleth  in  you  ? 
If  any  man,  by  carnal  strife,  spoil  this  temple,  God 
will  cast  him  out  of  it,  —  so  that  he  shall  no  more 
be  one  of  its  living  stones.  The  Temple  of  God  is 
holy,  —  but  there  is  no   holiness  where  there  is  no 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  55 

peace.  God  is  not  the  author  of  divisions."  And 
all  things  serve  the  soul :  the  Universe,  all  Life  and 
Providence,  are  but  its  ministers  and  helpers  to  God. 
Why,  then,  glory  in  any  of  his  agents,  when,  through 
all  things  that  exist,  God  is  inviting  us  to  have  our 
glory  and  our  joy  in  him  ?  "  Let  no  man  glory  in  men ; 
for  all  things  are  yours,  —  whether  Paul,  or  Apollos, 
or  Cephas,  or  the  world,  or  life,  or  death,  or  things 
present,  or  things  to  come,  —  all  are  yours ;  but  ye 
are  Christ's,  and  Christ  is  God's."  This  is  the  doc- 
trine of  Peace.  There  is  unity  in  all  hearts  when 
they  rise  to  and  rest  in  God ;  their  dissensions  are  all 
below,  when  they  stop  short  among  his  means  and 
instruments. 

So  unused  are  we  to  that  elevation  of  thought 
which  regards  the  spiritual  life  of  his  children  as 
the  central  object  of  all  God's  works  and  agencies 
here,  —  all  their  influences  to  be  transmitted  to  our 
souls,  —  all  their  beauty  to  open  a  thirst  in  our 
hearts  for  divine  perfection,  —  all  their  teachings  to 
build  us  up#in  heavenly  knowledge,  —  so  timid  are 
we  of  assuming  this  providential  attitude  towards 
the  vast  system  of  Life  and  Nature  spread  around 
us,  that  the  practical  force  of  the  Apostle's  sentiment 
is  feebly  realized.  That  all  things  are  oiirs,  sounds 
strangely  and  unnaturally  in  our  ears.  It  might  be 
an  unchristian  sentiment,  so  little  is  it  breathed 
forth  by  prevailing  systems.  Yet  Christ  lived,  and 
made  all  things  his ;  —  and  he  left  us  the  example 
that  all  should  do  likewise,  —  and  that  our  Lord 
should  be  but  the  first-born  among  many  brethren, 
—  the  first  Son  of  God  among  men,  but  the  guide 


56  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

to  all  the  rest.  And  when  we  behold  him  with  his 
universal  spirit,  in  the  midst  of  God's  universal  act- 
ings, directing  every  stream  of  experience  inwards 
upon  himself,  to  deposit  in  his  soul  its  own  freight 
of  good ;  —  when  we  see  that  to  his  understanding 
spirit  and  moulding  love  nothing  was  unavailable 
to  spiritual  uses; — when  we  read  how  full  to  his 
eye  the  world  was  of  spiritual  light,  —  how  the  frail 
flowers  had  connections  with  the  Lord  of  Providence, 

—  that  in  childhood's  unshadowed  heart  his  spirit 
beheld  his  Father's  love  of  purity,  —  in  the  moral  ad- 
justments of  an  infant's  mind  discerning  the  earthly 
type  of  the  children  of  the  heavenly  kingdom;  — 
when  we  read  those  parables,  the  suggestions  of  an 
every-day  experience,  and  perceive  how  each  passing 
incident  prompted  the  lesson  of  instruction,  and 
opened  a  channel  for  the  outward  flow  of  holy  wis- 
dom, so  that  to  his  employment  of  God's  commonest 
gifts  and  opportunities  might  be  applied  his  own 
memorable  words  after  the  feast  which  miracle  had 
spread,  "  Gather  up  the  fragments  that,  nothing  be 
lost"; — when  through  his  eventful  history  we  find 
him  neglecting  no  opportunity,  however  humble,  of 
drawing  strength  and  motive  from  the  aids  and  in- 
struments around  him,  —  placing  his  nature  beneath 
the  influences  which  make  Duty  both  holy  and  dear, 

—  now  gathering  on  his  tasked  heart  the  sustaining 
pressure  of  human  love,  —  and  now  alone  with  God, 
watching  out  the  stars  in  prayer,  —  calming  nature's 
reluctance  to  pass  through  every  darker  scene  by  the 
summoned  thought  that  God  was  proposing  to  glo- 
rify his  Name,  and  that  for  this  end  came  he  to  this 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    III.  57 

hour ;  —  then  do  we  begin  to  understand,  for  we  per- 
ceive how  he  understood  it,  that  there  is  nothing 
which  may  not  be  instrumental  to  build  up  a  meek 
and  lofty  spirit,  —  that  for  moral  uses  and  the  growth 
of  the  Christian  mind,  "  all  things  are  ours,  —  wheth- 
er the  world,  or  life,  or  death,  or  things  present,  or 
things  to  come,  —  all  are  ours,  —  and  we  are  Christ's, 
and  Christ  is  God's  " ;  —  for  our  Lord  and  Leader 
guides  us  to  our  common  Father. 

Now,  it  is  easy  to  rail  against  other  men's  super- 
stitions, but  there  is  only  one  way  of  being  true  spir- 
itual worshippers  of  God  ourselves,  and  that  is,  by 
making  all  things  ours.  Nor  would  it  be  difficult  to 
perceive,  were  we  spiritually  inclined,  how  this  doc- 
trine might  be  practically  verified,  that  all  things  are 
ours.  The  World,  —  is  it  not  fitted  to  educate  and 
mature  us  until  our  dying  day,  —  to  teach  wisdom, 
strong  purpose,  self-control,  and  patience,  and  love 
unwearied?  Its  trials,' its  uncertainties,  its  calls  to 
exertion,  its  daily  proffered  means  and  instruments 
of  usefulness,  —  are  they  not  ours^  and  is  there  a 
day  in  which  they  are  not  available  for  our  lasting 
good  ?  Life^  says  the  Apostle,  —  deep,  sacred,  mys- 
terious life,  with  its  first  activities,  its  dreams  of 
happiness,  its  struggles  to  realize  them,  —  its  visions 
and  its  hopes,  all  finding  at  last  their  noblest  good 
in  Christian  duty,  —  in  the  patient  and  faithful  do- 
ing of  what  our  hand  findeth  to  do,  —  and  Deaths 
breathing  its  hushing  strain  of  tender  and  solemn 
wisdom  over  the  turbulent  agitations  of  too  eager 
life,  and  all  its  fond  and  confident  pursuits,  —  Death 
with  its  twofold   beckoning,   one    to  the   available 


58  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

time  that  is  passing  away,  and  one  to  the  eternity, 
the  home  of  God,  that  knows  no  change ;  —  "  Things 
present^^  where  all  we  have  of  holiness  or  hope  has 
been  learned,  and  where  all  of  good  that  really  be- 
longs to  us  has  been  wrought  out  in  trial;  —  and 
^'•Things  to  come^^  our  Faith  in  which  heals  the 
wounds  of.  life,  and  stores  our  hearts  with  undecay- 
ing  affections ;  —  all  these  are  ours^  if  we  are  Christ's^ 
for  he  made  them  ours  by  teaching  us  to  use  them, 
—  and  when  we  appropriate  their  power,  we  but 
take  him  for  Master  and  Lord.  And  Christ  is 
God's :  his  mission  was  to  show  us  the  Father,  — 
to  make  us  one  with  Him,  even  as  he  was; -^ he 
wrought  in  His  power,  he  spoke  in  His  name,  he 
sought  His  glory;  —  and  so  we  rise  from  the  in- 
fluences of  earth  to  our  Father's  throne  in  heaven, 
and  we  rest  in  the  faith,  that  as  the  shadow  of  his 
protection  has  been  over  us  here,  so  shall  it  be, 
for  ever  and  for  ever. 

And  this  is  the  Christian  doctrine  of  Unity  :  — 
That  we  all  are  to  be  one  in  God,  and  that  it  is  the 
mission  of  all  things  under  God  to  lead  us  to  our 
FatheT,  and  so  promote  his  glory  alone. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  59 


SECTION    IV. 

AN     apostle's     way     OF     APPLYING     APOSTOLIC     AUTHORITY 
TO    THE    STRIFES    OF    A    CHURCH. 


CHAP.  IV.    1-21. 


1  Let  a  man  account  us,  as  ministers  of  Christ,  and 

2  stewards  of  the  mysteries  of  God.     What  remains  is,  that 

3  it  is  required  of  stewards  that  each  be  faithful.  But 
with  me  it  is  a  very  small  thing  that  I  should  be  judged  by 
you,  or  by  human   measurement :  nay,  I  judge  not  my- 

4  self.  For  I  am  conscious  of  nothing  against  myself;  yet 
not  by  this  am  I  justified,  for  he  that  judgeth  me  is  the 

5  Lord.  Wherefore,  judge  nothing  before  the  time,  until 
the  Lord  come,  who  will  both  bring  to  light  the  hidden 
things  of  darkness,  and  will  make- manifest  the  counsels 
of  hearts ;  and  then  praise  shall  be  to  each  from  God. 

6  And  these  things,  brethren,  I  have  transferred  to  my- 
self and  Apollos,  for  your  sakes,  that  ye  may  learn  by 
us  not  to  be  wise  above  what  is  written,  that  no  one  be 

7  inflated  on  behalf  of  one  against  another.  For  who 
maketh  thee  to  differ  ?  and  what  hast  thou  that  thou  didst 
not  receive  ?     But  if  thou  didst  receive  it,  why  dost  thou 

8  glory  as  if  thou  hadst  not  received  it  ^  Now  ye  are  full : 
now  ye  are  rich  :  ye  have  reigned  without  us  :  And  I 
would  ye  did  reig«,  that  we  also  might  reign  along  with 

9  you.     For  I  think  that  God  has  set  forth  us,  the  Apostles, 


60  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

last,  as  appointed  to  death,  that  we  might  be  made  a  spec- 
ie tacle  to  the  world,  both  to  angels  and  to  men.     We  are 

fools  for  Christ's  sake,  but  we  are  wise  in  Christ :  we  are 

weak,  but  ye  are  strong  ;  ye  are  honorable,  but  we  are  de- 
ll spised.     Up  to  this  present  hour  we  both  hunger  and  thirst, 

and  are  naked,  and  are  beaten,  and  have  no  certain  dwell- 

12  ing-place  ;  and  labor,  working  with  our  own  hands  :  being 

13  reviled,  we  bless :  being  persecuted,  we  endure  :  being 
defamed,  we  entreat :  we  are  made  as  the  expiation  of  the 
world,  the  ofTscouring  of  all  things  to  this  day. 

14  I  write  not  these  things  to  shame  you,  but  as  my  be- 

15  loved  sons  I  warn  you.  For  though  ye  have  ten  thou- 
sand teachers  in  Christ,  ye  have  not  many  fathers,  for 
I  have   begotten  you   in   Christ  Jesus  through  the  Gos- 

16  pel.     Wherefore,    I   beseech  you,   be    imitators  of  me. 

17  To  this  end  I  have  sent  unto  you  Timothy,  who  is  my 
beloved  and  faithful  son  in  the  Lord,  who  will  remind  you 
of  my  ways  in  Christ,  as  I  teach  everywhere  in  every 

18  Church.     Now  some  are  puffed  up,  as  if  I  were  not  com- 

19  ing  to  you.  But  I  will  come  to  you  shortly,  if  the  Lord 
will:  and   I  will   know  not  the  word  but  the  power  of 

20  those  who  are  puffed   up.     For  the  kingdom  of  God  is 

21  not  in  word,  but  in  power.  Which  choose  ye  ?  Shall  I 
come  to  you  with  a  rod,  or  in  love  and  the  spirit  of  mild- 
ness .'' 


It  is  only  in  the  most  advanced  state  of  religious 
knowledge,  that  the  individual  mind  takes  confidence 
to  abandon  mere  Symbols,  as  grounds  of  spiritual 
safety,  and  to  trust  itself  with  God  alone.  Long  as 
it  is  since  Christ  taught  the  sublime  doctrine,  that 
the  true  worshippers  worship  in  spirit  and  in  truth, 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  61 

by  the  reality  of  an  inward  communion  and  not  by 
outward  signs,  there  is  yet  no  universal  disposition 
amongst  men  to  rest  themselves,  or  to  permit  others 
to  rest,  in  this  direct  and  immediate  worship,  and, 
satisfied  with  knowing  that  God  is  in  his  temple 
within,  to  be  spiritually  independent  of  the  mere 
mechanism  of  Religion.  Few  are  the  minds  so 
purely  Christian,  that  they  dare  to  trust  themselves 
to  God  without  a  mediator,  or  to  look  within  for  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  In  these  days  spiritual  safety 
is  made  to  consist,  not  in  Christ's  feeling  of  union 
with  his  Father,  but  rather  in  interposing  as  much 
as  possible  what  are  called  Means  of  Grace,  —  in 
fact,  in  protecting  ourselves  against  God,  that,  in 
the  multitude  of  spiritual  contrivances,  we  may  get 
possession  of  the  true  watchword,  or  connect  our- 
selves with  some  outward  vehicle  of  favor,  —  sacer- 
dotal, sacramental,  or  doctrinal,  —  to  which  if  we 
but  cling  fast  we  may  find  a  passage  into  heaven. 
Where  are  the  Christians  who  can  put  aside  all  this 
intervening  machinery,  and  say  with  the  filial  heart 
of  Christ,  "  I  am  not  alone,  for  my  Father  is  with 
me  "  ?  Alas !  to  riieet  the  Deity  alone,  without  some 
intermediate  protection,  is  just  the  most  terrific  idea 
that  Theology  has  planted  in  the  common  mind. 
"  Prepare  to  meet  your  God ! "  are  words  employed 
to  awaken  the  terrors  of  the  soul,  —  and  the  inter- 
vention of  an  Intercessor  who  will  prevail  for  us,  as 
the  means  to  assuage  them.  To  many  minds,  a 
Christianity  in  spirit  and  in  truth,  the  filial  relation 
of  Christ  to  God,  appears  to  afford  no  protection,  — 
in  fact,  to  be  no  Religion^  —  a  word  that  seems  to 


62  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

be  used  in  the  old  heathen  sense,  of  something  so 
prescribed  that  a  man  can  observe  it  with  an  out- 
ward exactitude  and  certainty,  —  and  which  when 
observed  binds  God  to  show  favor.  To  profess  that 
your  whole  Christianity  consists  in  making  your 
own  spirit  a  living  temple  for  God,  employing  as 
your  greatest  aid  the  study  and  imitation  and  spirit- 
ual attraction  of  his  Christ,  is  held  to  be  no  definite 
answer  to  the  question,  What  do  you  believe  ?  what 
are  your  grounds  of  Hope  ?  what  is  your  Chris- 
tianity ? 

How  often  are  Unitarians  met  with  that  ques- 
tion. What  is  Unitarianism,  —  ivhat  is  your  Religion  ? 
And  the  question  always  means  this :  "  What  are 
your  special  reliances,  that  you  have  secured  for 
yourselves  a  protection  against  God  ?  "  If  you  say, 
"  Christianity  has  taught  you  to  have  faith  in  the 
divine  Love,  and  to  seek  immediate  communion 
with  the  Father  of  the  soul,  —  and  that  the  Son  of 
God  has  shown  us  how  to  prepare  the  heart  for  some 
inward  union  with  God's  spirit,"  —  you  are  thought 
to  say  a  thing  utterly  vague,  indefinite,  shadowy,  — 
in  fact,  to  have  no  certain  grounds  of  safety,  no  defi- 
nite terms  on  the  observance  of  which  you  can  hold 
God  bound  to  save  you.  For  this  is  what  is  chiefly 
sought  for  in  religion,  —  this  is  the  refined  selfishness 
of  spiritual  anxiety ;  —  "  How  can  I  get  assured  of 
my  safety,  —  how  can  I  hold  God  pledged  to  me  ?  — 
Let  me  know  what  I  am  to  believe  in  as  the  terms 
of  salvation,  —  what  are  the  outward  observances 
that  God  has  appointed  as  the  conditions  of  final 
Mercy  ? "  —  and  so  vanish,  in  this  legal  and  cove- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV. 


63 


nanting  temper,  all  the  filial  trusts  of  a  religious 
mind,  — the  worship  of  the  Father  in  the  spirit  of  a 
child's  faith  and  reality.  There  never  was  a  time, 
since  the  Reformers,  with  a  dim  consciousness  of 
spiritual  freedom,,  made  their  ineffectual  protest, 
when  Christianity  was  so  prominently  an  ecclesias- 
tical, and  so  little  a  spiritual  interest.  On  all  sides 
the  machinery  is  thrust  upon  you,  as  if  it  was  the  in- 
ward and  essential  life.  Not  the  soul's  communion 
with  God,  but  the  agency  of  a  Church, —  not  prac- 
tical discipleship  to  the  Lord  Jesus,  the  baptism  of 
the  affections  into  the  spirit  of  his  life  and  death,  but 
the  efficacy  of  the  sacraments,  —  not  faith  in  God, 
but  belief  in  doctrines,  —  not  reliance  on  divine  Be- 
ings, but  confidence  in  dead  rites  and  propositions : 

—  these  are  the  essentials  of  which  we  hear  so  much, 

—  the  symbols  every  thing,  the  Realities  forgotten. 
Even  the  dying  wretch,  on  whose  crimes  man  will 
have  no  mercy,  is  taught  to  lay  hold  on  the  symbol, 
and,  naming  the  name  of  Christ,  to  exult  in  his  safe- 
ty. The  man  who  has  spent  his  life  without  God 
in  the  world,  will  yet  close  it  with  some  feeling  of 
protection  if  he  has  partaken  of  the  Sacrament  on 
his  dying  bed ;  —  the  most  worldly  deem  there  is 
some  security  in  avowing  an  attachment  to  the  Bi- 
ble, —  and  the  Ministers  of  the  Gospel  of  repentance 
and  newness  of  life  not  only  assume,  but,  so  little 
are  they  aware  of  the  degradation,  vindicate,  their 
exclusive  claims  to  the  character  of  spiritual  Magi- 
cians. 

The  Priest  is  the  symbol  that,  in  all   ages,  the 
common  mind  has  substituted  for  a  spiritual  com- 


64  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

munication  with  God  within  the  soul  of  the  wor- 
shipper. The  worldly  man,  occupied  with  low  and 
perishable  interests,  and  conscious  of  no  sanctity  or 
elevation  of  desire,  has  always  shrunk  from  a  direct 
intercourse  with  God,  and  interposed  some  media- 
tor, set  apart  from  common  life,  whose  office  it  is  to 
perform  religious  services  for  the  people,  —  to  pray 
not  loith  them,  but  for  them, —  and  through  a  sanc- 
tified medium  to  convey  supplications  which  God 
would  not  listen  to  from  profan'er  lips.  There  is  no 
superstition  that  lingers  so  long  upon  the  earth,  for 
there  is  none  that  so  accommodates  the  mechanical 
devotion  of  the  material  mind,  as  the  peculiar  con- 
secration of  places  and  of  persons.  There  is  some- 
thing definite  and  tangible,  conveying  assurance  of 
protection,  —  and  this  is  what  the  worldly  mind 
avowedly  requires  in  a  Religion,  —  in  being  able  to 
go  to  some  authorized  intercessor  who  has  access 
to  the  ear  of  the  Almighty,  —  or  to  some  holy  place 
which  imparts  a  consecration,  makes  prayer  accept- 
able to  Heaven,  and  communicates  to  the  pilgrim,  in 
virtue  of  his  bodily  presence,  a  spiritual  charm.  Re- 
ligion in  its  common  forms  has  ever  been,  and  con- 
tinues to  be,  an  attempt  to  possess  one's  self  of  the 
low  satisfaction  of  security,  by  means  of  prescribed 
services,  so  definite  and  tangible  that  the  purchaser 
of  heaven  can  be  in  no  doubt  that  he  has  fulfilled 
his  part  of  the  covenant,  —  having  transferred  the 
terms  from  the  spiritual  qualifications  of  the  soul, 
which  might  raise  many  a  doubt,  to  a  Creed,  or  a 
Sacrament,  which  may  be  reduced  to  a  matter  of 
absolute  certainty.     I  mean  not  to  say  any  thing  so 


COR.    CHAP.    IV. 


65 


harsh,  and  I  belive  sp  false,  as  that  those  who  adopt 
this  mechanical  religion  expressly  desire  to  divest 
themselves  of  any  part  of  their  moral  obligations ; 
or  that  they  seek  to  have  a  claim  upon  the  kingdom 
of  God  in  a  local. heaven,  without  having  the  king- 
dom of  God  within.  It  is  their  want  of  Trusty  not 
their  avoidance  of  moralities,  that  materializes  their 
religious  character,  and  embarrasses  the  spirit  of  life 
within  them  by  unnatural  adjuncts,  —  fastening  the 
dead  to  the  living ;  —  it  is  the  absence  of  all  Faith  in 
a  spiritual  God,  who  manifests  himself  to  the  de- 
voutly pure,  and  bestows  immediate  salvation  on  the 
filial  heart,  that  narrows  the  religious  sympathies, 
and  makes  bigotry  the  honest  expression  of  a  selfish 
alarm;  —  it  is  the  spirit  of  Fear^  seeking,  not  to 
evade  a  Duty,  but  to  allay  the  torments  of  distrust, 
that  by  the  bonds  of  express  conditions  desires  to 
lay  an  outward  hold  on  God,  —  and  to  have,  as  it 
were,  at  his  hands,  a  title-deed  to  heaven.  Does 
any  one  suppose  that  the  bigotry,  the  exclusive  and 
denunciatory  spirit  that  may  prevail,  is  primarily 
either  the  outbreak  of  positively  malign  passions,  or 
the  expression  of  a  disinterested  spiritual  anxiety  for 
the  heretic's  "  salvation  "  ?  It  is  originally  neither 
of  these,  —  though,  no  doubt,  it  often  partakes  of 
both.  It  is  neither  pure  hate  nor  pure  love,  but 
much  more  nearly  pure  fear ;  — it  is  the  expression 
of  irritation  that  you,  with  your  doubts  and  your 
rationalism,  have  broken  into  its  spiritual  repose ; 
you  have  disturbed  its  sense  of  security,  —  you  have 
dared  to  question,  and  expose  to  rude  investigation, 
the  virtue  of  the  spiritual  charm,  —  and  the  bigot's 


66  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

anger  is  not  so  much  zeal  on  your  account,  as  dis- 
composure on  his  own.  You  have  shaken,  what 
such  minds  chiefly  seek,  his  comfortable  assurance  in 
Religion. 

The  development  of  the  religious  nature  of  Man, 
even  under  Christianity,  though  in  many  quarters 
it  has  disguised  and  refined,  has  not  yet  removed 
this  substitution  of  the  Priest  for  the  Religion  of 
the  spirit  and  the  truth,  for  the  worship  and  conse- 
cration of  the  individual  soul.  The  Religions  of  an- 
tiquity, including  the  Jewish,  recognized  the  priest- 
hood of  peculiar  individuals ;  they  established  and 
consecrated  this  elementary  tendency  to  approach 
God  by  proxies  and  mediators,  —  for  that  which 
there  was  nothing  in  their  own  spirit  to  destroy, 
they  necessarily  sanctioned.  Both  Paganism  and 
Judaism,  at  least  in  its  later  forms,  appointed  7?ne5^5, 

—  men  set  apart  for  the  performance  of  holy  offices, 

—  who  had  an  access  to  God  denied  to  the  people, — 
who  offered  sacrifices  on  especial  altars,  which  would 
not  be  accepted  from  profaner  places  or  less  holy 
hands,  —  who  had  a  power  of  calling  down  a  bless- 
ing from  above  and  of  adjusting  the  relations  of 
Heaven  and  Earth,  which  it  would  be  the  last 
impiety,  only  to  be  expiated  by  death,  for  any  un- 
anointed  man  to  assume.  An'd  it  is  a  remarkable 
evidence  of  how  the  unenlightened  mind  clings  to 
the  idea  of  a  material  consecration,  and  of  mechani- 
cal conveyances,  that  the  priest  who  presented  the 
offering  of  the  people,  and  drew  down  the  answering 
blessing  from  on  high,  was  so  appropriated  to  dead 
things  that  never  change,  that  he  was  not  the  person 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  67 

employed  even  to  teach  morality,  —  was  not  looked 
to  as  the  national  Instructor,  —  was  not  in  any  way 
concerned  with  the  higher  agencies  of  intellectual 
civilization,  —  was  not  expected  to  be,  indeed  was 
not  permitted  to  be,  one  of  the  Lights  of  the  age. 
Under  Paganism  this  office  belonged  to  the  Philos- 
ophers, Poets,  Orators,  and  Statesmen;  —  under  Ju- 
daism it  formed  the  peculiar  function  of  the  Proph- 
ets. The  Priest  uttered  no  burning  word,  —  spoke 
no  vivifying  truth,  —  darted  no  light  direct  from  God 
into  the  selfish  heart  of  the  world,  —  rebuked  no  op- 
pression, —  broke  by  moral  force  no  oppressor's  chain ; 
—  but  there  he  stood  at  his  altar,  a  dead  symbol,  — 
an  official  personage,  —  not  acting  on  man  but  inter- 
ceding with  God,  —  a  mechanical  provision  that  cer- 
tain religious  formulas,  in  which  the  nation  might 
be  deeply  concerned,  should  not  be  neglected.  The 
Priest  received  no  inspiration  in  his  own  heart;  he 
was  holy  in  no  higher  sense  than  one  of  the  vessels 
of  the  temple  was  holy ;  he  was  professionally  sa- 
cred, —  officially  pious,  —  set  apart,  not  to  receive 
by  communion  with  God  a  divine  life  into  his  own 
soul,  and  thence  breathe  it  out  to  others,  but  what 
is  wholly  a  different  matter,  and  not  a  spiritual  but 
a  cabalistic  function,  to  communicate  an  outward 
consecration.  I  do  not  recollect,  either  in  Heathen 
or  in  Jewish  history,  one  single  instance  in  which  a 
Priest  was  one  of  the  higher  agents  of  God  for  the 
civilization  of  man.  Moses,  not  Aaron,  was  the 
Lawgiver  and  Statesman ;  and  Moses,  not  Aaron, 
understood  and  breathed  forth  the  mind  of  God. 
The  one  received  an  inspiration :  the  other  only  im- 


68  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

pa'ted  a  roi:secration.  Where  is  it  on  record  that 
a  priest  ever  purified  the  national  worship,  softened 
the  national  superstitions,  —  nay,  even  rebuked  the 
national  sins,  —  or,  by  his  hones^  reading  of  the  writ- 
ing on  the  wall,  made  tyrants  tremble  ?  I  profess 
not  to  know  :  for  when  the  ministers  of  Christ  have 
done  these  things,  as  their  Master  did,  they  were, 
like  Luther,  in  arms  against  the  sacerdotal  principle ; 
and  let  it  be  recollected  that  Christianity  knows  no 
hierarchy,  and  that  the  Prophet,  not  the  priest,  is 
the  successor  of  the  Apostles.  Looking  even  to  the 
priesthood  of  Judaism,  it  is  evident  that  God  made 
no  account  of  these  official  persons,  nor  expected 
true  service  from  them.  They  were  the  conservative 
symbols  of  the  existing  present, —  not  the  reforming 
influences  of  the  diviner  Future ;  and,  like  all  men 
used  for  official  purposes,  in  which  the  free  heart  has 
no  place  and -the  intellect  no  exercise,  they  were  tim- 
id, slavish,  timeserving.  It  was  a  Priest  who  yield- 
ed and  made  the  golden  calf  at  the.  bidding  of  the 
people,  —  and  no  priest,  but  a  Prophet,  who  dashed 
down  the  Tables  of  Stone  in  his  burst  of  righteous 
sorrow,  and  summoned  both  priest  and  people  to  a 
severe  account.  In  that  noble  legacy  to  all  genera- 
tions, the  Bible,  whose  effectual  inspiration  the  uni- 
versal heart  acknowledges,  the  Priest  has  left  us 
not  one  word  of  immortal  power.  He  whose  devo- 
tion still  flows  through  the  world,  like  a  refreshing 
stream,  was  no  priest,  but  a  man,  who,  though  not 
faultless  nor  unstained  by  great  sins,  was  yet,  in  the 
natural  movements  of  his  free  spirit,  in  his  self-kin- 
dled penitence,  piety,  and  love,  after  God's  own  heart. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  69 

Isaiah,  who  evangelized  Judaism,  was  no  priest. 
Daniel,  no  unworthy  image  of  Christ  in  the  judg- 
n  ent-hall,  was  no  official  formalist,  but  one  who 
communed  with  God,  and  spoke  out  the  divine  mo- 
nitions of  the  living  oracle.  In  the  light  of  these 
facts,  that  Judaism  tolerated  an  official  priesthood 
at  all,  can  only  be  explained  on  the  principle,  that 
Revelation  itself  has  an  historical  development, — 
that  it  was  not  intended  to  teach  absolute  Truth, 
but  to  apply  such  aids  to  the  mind,  as,  without  de- 
stroying its  own  freedom,  might  introduce  more  spir- 
itual ideas,  and  stimulate  the  unfolding  of  its  own 
powers.  It  is  the  gi-eat  peculiarity  of  Christianity, 
as  a  Religion,  that  it  has  abolished  the  priest,  —  that 
it  teaches  the  priesthood  of  the  soul,  —  and  that  to 
recognize  an  official  mediator  is  to  go  back  to  Pa- 
ganism or  Levitical  Judaism,  and  annul  the  distinc- 
tions of  the  Gospel.  "  The  true  worshippers  worship 
the  Father  in  spirit  and  in  truth :  and  the  Father 
seeketh  such  to  worship  him."  "  Know  ye  not  that 
ye  are  the  temple  of  God,  and  that  the  spirit  of  God 
dwelleth  in  you  ?  "  "  If  any  man  love  me,  he  wiU 
keep  my  words ;  and  my  Father  will  love  him,  and 
we  will  come  unto  him,  and  make  our  abode  with 
him."  It  is  remarkable  that  the  word  which  de- 
scribes the  priests  of  the  Pagan  and  Jewish  religions 
is  never  once  applied  in  any  part  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment to  the  Apostles  or  ministers  of  Christ.  He 
who  knew  what  was  in  man  recognized  in  every 
mind  a  divine  element  capable  of  entering  into  im- 
mediate communication  with  the  spirit  of  God.  He 
removed  the  barriers  of  materialism,  of  fear,  and  su- 


70  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

perstition,  and  outward  devotions,  and  into  the  pure 
and  seeking  heart  introduced  a  living  sense  of  the 
intimate  presence  of  God.  Christianity  is  the  only 
Rehgion  the  world  has  ever  known,  that  has  appoint- 
ed no  Altar,  no  Priest,  no  Sacrifice.  Its  altar  is  the 
humble  and  filial  heart ;  its  sacrifices  are  the  pas- 
sions; its  oblations,  the  desires  of  a  pure,  merciful 
spirit;  and  its  priest,  the  soul  that  devoutly  com- 
munes with  God.  This  is  a  remarkable  fact,  —  and 
running  counter,  as  it  does,  to  the  strongest  tenden- 
cies of  unspiritual  man,  —  to  the  still  unsubdued  dis- 
position to  repose  upon  symbols,  and  approach  God 
through  ecclesiastical  proxies,  it  augments  the  love 
and  veneration  with  which  we  place  ourselves  at  the 
feet  of  our  divine  Messiah. 

The  lower  tendencies  of  human  nature,  however, 
have  withstood  the  Gospel,  and  taken  their  own 
course,  —  and  still  a  Priesthood  makes  pretensions 
to  be  indispensable  mediators  to  the  Church  of  God; 
Nor  would  it  be  just  to  say,  that  these  superstitions 
originate  in  the  designing  policy  of  a  few  hierarchs  : 
they  have  their  roots  in  human  nature  ;  they  are 
accommodated  to  the  indolence,  the  weakness,  the 
selfish  fears,  and  unspiritual  distrusts  of  man.  It 
is  altogether  unphilosophical  to  call  this  state  of 
things  the  craft  of  priests.  It  is  priestcraft ;  but  it 
is  the  priestcraft  of  the  laity,  to  the  full  as  much  as 
the  priestcraft  of  the  clergy ;  —  it  is  the  low  and  me- 
chanical religion  of  the  one,  that  calls  into  existence 
the  low  and  mechanical  functions  of  the  other. 
Priestcraft  is  not  a  business  that  Priests  can  carry 
on  by  themselves  ;  the  people  must  be  abetting  and 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  71 

consenting  parties;  —  and  w*hen  we  look  into  the 
present  condition  of  the  religious  world,  and  witness 
the  ostentatious  profession  of  attachment  to  Sym- 
bols^ on  the  part  of  men  not  remarkable  for  purity  of 
sentiment  or  nobleness  of  life,  —  to  the  Bible,  the 
Church,  the  Creed,  the  Priest,  —  we  must  confess 
that  the  laity  are  often  the  tempting  parties.  The 
clergy  are  but  made  in  the  same  mould  ;  they  have 
not  the  Christian  elevation  to  refuse  such  functions 
as  degrading,  and  to  disown  such  allies  as  scanda- 
lous, —  and  they  partake,  themselves,  of  the  material 
tendency  to  rest  on  Symbols,  and  to  employ  me- 
chanical means  of  allaying  the  fears  of  superstition. 
Everywhere  do  we  discern  some  traces  of  this  the 
lowest  tendency  of  the  religious  nature,  —  the  desire 
for  an  official  Person,  on  the  part  of  those  who  are 
dimly  conscious  that  their  own  souls  are  not  in  spir- 
itual communication  with  God.  I  have  witnessed 
it  on  many  a  death-bed,  and,  in  moments  when  it  is 
impossible  to  be  unyielding,  have  felt  conscious  of 
the  only  degradation,  in  my  own  eyes,  that  the  Chris- 
tian ministry  has  ever  exposed  me  to.  I  have  known 
dying  men  ask  assurances  of  security,  and  attach  a 
painful  importance  to  the  prayer  in  which  a  fellow- 
man  asked  for  them  the  blessing  of  God ;  —  I  have 
seen  the  Lord's  Supper  eagerly  craved  by  those  who 
never  thought  of  it  before  ;  —  I  have  been  constrained 
to  administer  it  in  the  last  moments  of  trembling 
life,  —  not,  I  trust,  without  fidelity  to  the  spiritual 
Lord  of  the  soul ;  —  and  I  have  witnessed  the  bit- 
terest lamentations  of  survivors  because  death  had 
taken  place,  ere  the  rite  had  been  partaken.     Now 


72  FIRST   EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

if  such  things  have  fallen  under  my  experience,  what, 
I  ask,  must  be  the  temptations  which,  in  other  church- 
es, the  laity  throw  in  the  path  of  the  clergy  ?  And 
is  there  not  some  trace  of  the  disposition  for  an  offi.^ 
cial  Person  in  the  very  general  feeling,  from  which 
perhaps  no  church  is  free,  that  what  is  entirely 
innocent  and  allowable  in  another  man  may  be 
scandalous,  or  at  least  indecorous  and  unsafe,  in  a 
minister  of  religion?  —  and  has  not  this  impression 
its  roots  in  the  sacerdotal  tendency,  —  in  the  belief 
which  is  natural  to  the  lower  religious  states,  that 
there  is  a  professional  sacredness,  separable  from 
personal  sanctity,  in  which  the  community  may  have 
an  interest  ?  Now  we  readily  admit  that  the  min- 
isters of  religion  deserve  a  deeper  condemnation,  if 
they  scandalously  fall  away  from  the  one  standard 
of  Christian  duty,  —  because  there  are  peculiar  mo- 
tives and  influences  acting  upon  them,  and  because 
they  have  voluntarily  assumed  a  peculiar  office.  To 
the  strictness  of  judgment,  therefore,  we  do  not  ob- 
ject, —  but  we  do  object  to  the  sacerdotal  principle, 
that  there  are  different  standards  for  different  men, 
or  for  different  classes  of  men,  —  that  guilt  or  inno- 
cence, however  affected  by  knowledge  and  opportu- 
nity, has  any  relation  to  oflfice  or  profession,  —  that 
there  is  a  sacred  —  say  rather  a  desecrated  —  caste, 
set  apart  as  a  compensation  for  the  laxities  of  others, 
and  who  are  denied  any  portion  of  the  liberty  that 
can  safely,  or  righteously,  belong  to  any  Chris- 
tian man. 

It  was  the  claim  of  Priesthood  —  the  attempt  by 
official  and  sacerdotal  means  to  shut  out  the  individ- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  73 

ual  soul  from  God  —  that  awoke  the  indignation  of 
our  own  Wickliffe,  who  left  the  work  of  separation 
to  be  completed  two  centuries  after,  in  more  favor- 
able times,  by  the  more  fiery  strength,  but  perhaps 
inferior  spirit,  of  Luther.  It  was  the  same  claim, 
on  the  part  of  the  Reformers  themselves,  —  a  claim 
if  not  to  sacerdotal  efficacy,  to  doctrinal  infallibility, 
—  that  introduced  Sectarianism,  that  unhappy  off- 
spring of  Protestantism,  into  the  bosom  of  Christian- 
ity. And  now,  in  this  freer  day,  it  is  the  perception, 
openly  avowed,  that  the  doctrinal  teaching  of  the 
Anglican  Church  cannot  be  sustained  on  the  old 
Protestant  grounds  of  the  sufficiency  of  the  Bible 
and  the  rights  of  Private  Judgment,  that  has  driv- 
en a  large  proportion  of  her  clergy  back  upon  the 
bosom  of  Authority,  and  forced  them,  if  they  would 
retain  their  Faith,  to  seek  for  it  elsewhere.  Such,  in 
every  age,  has  been  the  discord  produced  by  official 
substitutes,  and  by  an  unspiritual  disregard  of  the 
free  priesthood  of  the  Soul. 

And  in  these  days  of  Ecclesiastical  pretensions, 
and  of  the  wonderful  assumption  of  Apostolical  Suc- 
cession, it  is  worth  while  to  ask  how  an  Apostle 
did  deal  with  such  difficulties  when  they  came  be- 
fore himself,  —  what  claim  he  set  up  when  a  Church, 
planted  by  himself,  was  split  into  factions,  —  what 
authority  he  claimed  over  rival  teachers,  when,  in 
the  very  height  and  glory  of  his  Apostleship,  they 
broke  the  Christian  unity  which  he  had  labored  to 
establish,  and  sought  to  bring  himself  into  contempt. 
He  seeks  to  restore  peace,  simply  by  abolishing  the 
pretensions  of  individuals,  his  own  included,  —  and 


74  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

by  awakening  in  each  man  the  priesthood  of  his 
own  spirit,  —  the  sense  of  his  accountability  to  God 
alone.  Such  is  the  great  spiritual  lesson  of  this 
fourth  chapter  as  to  the  claims  of  Individuals  in 
the  Church  ;  —  and  as  it  contained  no  material  diffi- 
culties that  required  lengthened  interpretation,  and 
is  much  required  at  the  present  time,  I  have  used 
it  for  this  purpose  alone. 

I  shall  now  simply  present  this  Apostolic  view 
of  Apostolic  Authority,  intended  by  St.  Paul  as  a 
lesson  in  the  wisdom  of  peace  and  humility  to  the 
other  Teachers  of  the  Church  :  — 

"  Account  us  as  nothing  in  ourselves,  —  being 
but  servants  of  Christ,  and  stewards  of  the  revela- 
tions of  God.  And  as  stewards  we  can  deserve  no 
praise  but  that  of  fidelity,  —  for  a  steward  is  but  a 
dispenser  of  his  master's  bounty.  And  whether  we 
Apostles  are  faithful  or  not  in  our  stewardship  of 
the  Gospel,  God  alone  must  judge.  With  me  it  is 
a  small  thing  to  have  the  judgment  of  man,  —  nay, 
I  dare  not  judge  myself;  for  though  I  am  conscious 
of  no  unfaithfulness  [this  clause  is  made  completely 
unintelligible  in  our  version  by  the  translation,  '/or 
I  knoiv  nothing-  hy  myself^]  in  myself,  yet  am  I  not 
therefore  clear;  for  he  that  judgeth  me  is  the  spirit- 
searching  God.  Therefore,  ye  leaders  of  parties, 
judge  nothing  before  the  time,  —  until  the  Lord 
come,  who  will  bring  to  light  the  hidden  motives  of 
men,  and  make  manifest  the  counsels  of  the  heart; 
—  and  then  shall  each  have  his  due  praise  from 
God. 

"  And    these  things,  brethren,  I    have  applied    to 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  /O 

myself  and  Apollos,  through  tenderness  for  you,  — 
that  ye  might  learn  in  our  humility  not  to  think  of 
Leaders  above  that  which  is  here  prescribed,  —  and 
that  no  one  party  of  you  be  puffed  up  for  one 
Teacher  against  another.  Who  maketh  thee  to  dif- 
fer from  another  ?  What  hast  thou,  that  thou  didst 
not  receive  ?  And  if  you  are  but  a  steward  of  it, 
why  do  you  erect  yourself  into  a  party  leader,  as  if 
it  was  your  own  ?  Witness  us  Apostles,  and  con- 
trast the  claims  of  your  proud  leaders  with  our  low 
estate.  Ye  are  full,  ye  are  rich,  ye  have  lorded  it 
as  kings  without  us,  —  and  I  would  to  God  that  ye 
did  reign  in  the  true  supremacy  of  the  Gospel,  that 
we  also  might  share  in  the  peace  of  that  kingdom. 
For  I  think  that  God  hath  set  forth  us  the  Apostles, 
—  as  those  who  are  brought  forth  last  on  the  Am- 
phitheatre, to  be  devoted  to  death.  We  are  made 
the  suffering  fools  for  Christ's  sake,  but  ye  are  the 
wise  in  Christ ;  we  are  weak,  but  ye  are  strong ; 
ye  are  honorable,  but  we  are  despised.  Even 
unto  this  present  hour,  we  both  hunger  and  thirst, 
and  are  naked,  and  are  beaten,  and  have  no  certain 
dwellin|;-place,  and  labor,  working  with  our  own 
hands  ;  being  reviled,  we  bless,  —  being  persecuted, 
we  submit,  —  being  defamed,  we  entreat ;  —  we  are 
made  the  expiation  of  the  earth,  the  ofi'scouring  of 
all  things  until  this  day. 

"  I  write  not  these  things  to  shame  you  by  the 
contrast,  —  but,  being  my  beloved  sons  in  the  Gos- 
pel, I  admonish  you.  For  though  ye  have  ten 
thousand  instructors  in  Christ,  yet  have  ye  not 
many  fathers ;  for  in  Christ  Jesus  I  have  begotten 


76  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

you  as  my  spiritual  children,  by  preaching  to  you 
the  Gospel.  Wherefore  I  beseech  you,  be  imitators 
of  me.  And  to  this  end  I  have  sent  unto  you 
Timothy,  who  is  my  beloved  and  faithful  son  in 
the  Lord,  that  he  may  remind  you  of  my  ways 
in  Christ,  as  I  teach  everywhere  in  every  Church. 
Now  some  are  puffed  up,  as  though  I  would  not 
venture  to  come  to  you.  But  I  will  come  to  you 
shortly,  if  the  Lord  will,  —  and  I  will  know  not 
the  speech  of  those  who  are  puffed  up,  but  their 
inward  power.  For  the  kingdom  of  God  does  not 
manifest  itself  in  Speech,  —  but  in  spiritual  Power. 
Which  choose  ye?  Shall  I  come  to  you  with  a 
rod,  or  in  love  and  the  spirit  of  mildness  ?  " 


PART   II. 

(chaps,    v. -XI.) 

THE  IMMORALITIES  AND  PERPLEXITIES 
OF  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH. 


PART   11. 

(chapters    v. -XI.) 


SECTION  I. 

SPECULATIVE  PRETENSIONS  AND  MORAL  ROTTENNESS. — 
INCEST. LITIGATIONS.  ^ —  DOMESTIC  RELATIONS  BE- 
TWEEN   BELIEVERS    AND   UNBELIEVERS. 


CHAPS.  V.-VII. 

V.  1.  It  is  commonly  reported  that  there  is  fornication 
among  you,  and  such  fornication  as  is  not  even  among 
the    Gentiles,  —  that    a   man    should    have    his   father's 

2  wife.  And  you  are  puffed  up  !  and  have  not  rather 
mourned   that  he   that  hath    done   this  thing   might   be 

3  taken  away  from  among  you.  For  I,  verily,  as  present 
in  spirit,  though  absent  in  body,  have  judged  already 
as  if  I  was    present,  him   that  hath  so  done  this  thing, 

4  —  In  the  name  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  when  you 
and   my  spirit   are   gathered  together,  with    the   power 

5  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  to  commit  such  an  one  to 
Satan   for   the    extinction   of  the    flesh,  that    the    spirit 

6  may  be  delivered  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  Your 
boasting  is  not  good.     Know  ye  not,  that  a  little  leaven 


80  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

7  leaveneth  the  whole  lump  ?  Purge  out  the  old  leaven 
that  ye  may  be  a  new  lump,  inasmuch  as  ye  are  un- 
leavened,—  since   our  Passover,  Christ,  is  slain  for  us. 

8  Wherefore  let  us  keep  Passover,  —  not  with  the  old 
leaven,  nor  with  the  leaven  of  evil  and  wickedness,  but 
with  the  unleavened  bread  of  purity  and  truth. 

9  I  wrote  to  you  in  an  epistle  not  to  company  with  for- 

10  nicators,  not  indeed  absolutely,  as  including  the  fornicators 
of  this  world,  or  the  covetous,  the  rapacious,  and  the  idola- 

11  trous,  for  then  must  ye  have  gone  out  of  the  world ;  but 
now  I  have  written  to  you,  if  any  one  called  a  brother  is 
a  fornicator,  or  covetous,  or  idolatrous,  or  a  railer,  or  a 
drunkard,  or  rapacious,  with  such  an  one  not  to  keep  com- 

12  pany,  not  even  to  eat.     For  what  have  P  to  do  with  judg- 

13  ing  those  without  ?  Do  not  ye  judge  those  within  ?  But 
those  without,  God  will  judge.  Put  away  from  among 
yourselves  that  wicked  person. 

VI.  1.  Dare  any  of  you,  having  a  suit  against  another,  go 
to  law  before  the  unrighteous,  and  not  before  the  saints  ? 

2  Do  ye  not  know  that  the  saints  shall  judge  the  world,  and 
if  the  world  is  judged  by  you,  are  ye  unworthy  to  judge 

3  the  smallest  cases  ?  Know  ye  not  that  we  shall  judge 
angels  ?  how  much  more  things  that  pertain  to  this  life  ? 

4  If  then  ye  have  judgments  of  things  pertaining  to  this  life, 
do  ye  appoint  those  to  judge  who  have  no  place  in  the 

5  Church  ?  I  speak  this  to  your  shame.  Is  it  that  there  is 
not  even  one  wise  man  among  you  who  is  able  to  judge 

6  between  brother  and  brother,  —  but  brother  goeth  to  law 

7  with  brother,  and  that  at  the  bar  of  unbelievers  ?  Now 
therefore  there  is  utterly  a  fault  among  you,  that  ye  go  to 
law  with  one  another.    Why  do  ye  not  rather  suffer  wrong  ? 

8  why  are  ye  not  rather  defrauded  ?  Whereas  ye  wrong, 
and  defraud,  and  that  your  brethren. 


I.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  81 

9  Know  ye  not  that  the  unrighteous  shall  not  inherit  the 
kingdom  of  God  ?  Be  not  deceived  ;  nor  fornicators,  nor 
idolaters,  nor  adulterers,  nor  effeminate,  nor  abusers  of 

10  themselves  with  mankind,  nor  thieves,  nor  covetous,  nor 
drunkards,  nor  revilers,  nor  plunderers,  shall  inherit  the 

11  kingdom  of  God.  And  such  were  some  of  you  :  but  ye 
have  been  washed,  ye  have  been  sanctified,  ye  have  been 
justified  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  and  in  the  spirit 
of  our  God. 

12  All  things  are  lawful  to  me  ;  but  all  things  are  not  ex- 
pedient :    all   things   are  lawful  to  me  ;  but  I  will  not  be 

13  brought  under  the  power  of  any.  Meats  for  the  belly,  and 
the  belly  for  meats  ;  but  God  will  destroy  both  it  and  them. 
And  the  body  is  not  for  fornication,  but  for  the  Lord,  and 

14  the  Lord  for  the  body.     And  God  has  both  raised  up  the 

15  Lord,  and  will  raise  us  up  by  his  own  power.  Know  ye 
not  that  your  bodies  are  members  of  Christ  ?  Shall  I 
then  take  members  of  Christ,  and  make  them  members 

16  of  a  harlot  ?  Be  it  not  so.  Know  ye  not  that  he  who  is 
joined  to  a  harlot  is  one  body  ?  for  it  is  said,  they  two 

17  shall  be  as  one  flesh.    But  he  that  is  joined  to  the  Lord  is 

18  one  spirit.  Flee  fornication  :  ever}'-  sin  that  a  man  doeth 
is  without  the  body;  but  he  that  committeth  fornication 

19  sinneth  against  his  own  body.  Know  ye  not  that  your 
body  is  the  temple  of  the  holy  spirit  which  is  in  you,  which 

20  ye  have  from  God,  and  that  ye  are  not  your  own  ?  For  ye 
have  been  bought  with  a  price  :  glorify  therefore  God  in 
in  your  body. 

Vn.  1.  Now  concerning  the  things  whereof  you  wrote 
to  me :  It  is  good  for  a  man  not  to  touch  a  woman ;  — 

2  Nevertheless,  because  of  fornication,  let  every  man  have 

3  his  own  wife,  and  every  woman  her  own  husband.  Let 
the  husband  render  what  is  due  to  the  wife,  and  the  wife  to 


82  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

4  the  husband.  The  wife  hath  not  power  of  her  own  body, 
but  the  husband  :  and  likewise  also  the  husband  hath  not 

5  power  of  his  own  body,  but  the  wife.  Deprive  not  each 
other,  unless  with  consent  for  a  time,  that  ye  may  have 
opportunit}^  for  prayer,  and  be  together  again,  that  Satan 

6  may  not  tempt  you  through  your  incontinence.     But  this 

7  I  say  on  concession,  and  not  by  command.  For  I  would 
that  all  men  were  even  as  I  myself:  but  each  hath  his 
own  gift  from  God,  one  after  this  manner,  another  after 

.    that. 

8  Now  I  say  to  the  unmarried  and  widows,  it  is  good  for 

9  them  if  they  abide  even  as  I.  But  if  they  cannot  contain, 
let  them  marry:  for  it  is  better  to  marry  than  to  burn. 

10  And  to  the  married  I  command,  not  I,  but  the  Lord  :  Let 

11  not  the  wife  be  separated  from  her  husband  ;  but  if  she 
be  separated,  let  her  remain  unmarried,  or  be  reconciled 
to  her  husband  ;  —  and  let  not  the  husband  put  away  his 
wife. 

12  But  to  the  rest,  I  speak,  not  the  Lord  :  If  any  brother 
hath  an  unbelieving  wife,  and  she  herself  be  pleased  to 

13  dwell  with  him,  let  him  not  put  her  away.  And  if  any 
woman  hath  an  unbelieving  husband,  and  he  be  pleased 

14  to  dwell  with  her,  let  her  not  put  him  away.  For  the  un- 
believing wife  is  sanctified  in  the  husband,  and  the  un- 
believing husband   is   sanctified  in  the  wife  :   else  were 

15  your  children  unclean,  but  now-are  they  holy.  But  if  the 
unbelieving  depart,  let  him  depart :  a  brother  or  a  sister 
is  not  in  bondage  to  such  ;  but  God  hath  called  us  to  peace. 

16  For  how  knowest  thou,  O  wife,  if  thou  shalt  save  thine 
husband  ?  Or  how  knowest  thou,  O  husband,  if  thou  shalt 
save  thy  wife  ? 

17  But  as  the  Lord  hath  distributed  to  each,  as  God  hath 
called  each,  so  let  him  walk.     And  so  I  ordain  in  all  the 

18  Churches.    Hath  any  one  been  called,  being  circumcised  ? 


I.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  83 

Let   him  not  become    uncircumcised.      Hath  any  been 
called  in  uncircumcision  ?     Let  him  not  become  circum- 

19  cised.      Circumcision  is  nothing ;  and  uncircumcision  is 
nothing;  but  the  keeping  of  the  commandments  of  God. 

20  Let  each  remain  in  that  caUing  [class],  wherein  he  was 

21  called.  Wert  thou  called,  being  a  slave  ?  Let  it  be  no 
care  to  you  ;  but  if  thou  canst  become  free,  use  it  rather. 

22  For  he  that  is  called  in  the  Lord,  being  a  slave,  is  the 
Lord's  freeman ;  and  likewise  he  that  is  called,  being  free, 

23  is  Christ's  bondsman.    Ye  have  been  bought  with  a  price  : 

24  become  not  the  slaves  of  men.  Brethren,  let  each  re- 
main with  God  in  that  state  in  which  he  was  called. 

25  Now  concerning  the  unmarried  I  have  no  commandment 
of  the  Lord,  but  I  give  my  judgment,  as  one  that  hath  ob- 

26  tained  mercy  from  the  Lord  to  be  faithful.  I  think,  then, 
that  this  is  good,  because  of  the  present  distress ;  that  it  is 

27  good  for  a  man  so  to  be.  Art  thou  bound  to  a  wife  ?  seek 
not  deliverance.     Art  thou  free  from  a  wife  ?  seek  not  a 

28  wife.  But  yet  if  thou  marry,  thou  hast  not  sinned.  And 
if  a  virgin  marry,  she  hath  not  sinned  ;  yet  such  shall  have 

29  trouble  in  the  flesh  ;  but  I  spare  you.  But  this  I  say, 
brethren,  —  the  time  is  short.    It  remaineth  that  both  they 

30  that  have  wives  be  as  though  they  had  none  ;  and  they 
that  weep,  as  though  they  wept  not ;  and  they  that  rejoice, 
as  though  they  rejoiced  not ;  and  they  that  buy,  as  though 

31  they  possessed  not ;  and  they  that  use  this  world,  as  though 
they  abused  it  not ;  for  the  fashion  of  this  world  passeth 

32  away.  But  I  would  have  you  to  be  without  anxiety  :  the 
unmarried  careth  about  the  things  of  the  Lord,  how  he 

33  may  please  the  Lord :  but  the  married  careth  about  the 

34  things  of  the  world,  how  he  may  please  his  wife.  There 
is  difference  between  a  wife  and  a  virgin.  The  unmarried 
careth  for  the  things  of  the  Lord,  that  she  may  be  holy 
both  in  body  and  in  spirit ;  but  the  married  careth  for  the 


84  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

things  of  the  world,  how  she  may  please  her  husband. 

35  This  I  speak  for  your  own  benefit,  not  that  I  may  cast  a 
snare  upon  you,  —  but  for  that  which  is  becoming,  and 
for  your  assiduousness  to  the  Lord  without  distraction. 

36  But  if  any  one  think  that  he  behaveth  himself  unbe- 
comingly towards  his  virgin,  if  she  pass  her  prime,  and 
accordingly  it  ought  to  be,  —  let  him  do  what  he  willeth, 

37  he  sinneth  not ;  let  them  marry.  But  he  that  standeth 
steadfast  in  his  heart,  not  having  necessity,  and  hath  lib- 
erty according  to  his  own  will,  and  so  hath  determined  in 

38  his  heart  that  he  will  keep  his  virgin,  doeth  well.  So  then 
he   that   marrieth  doeth  well ;  but  he  that  marrieth  not 

39  doeth  better.  A  wife  is  bound  so  long  as  her  husband 
liveth ;  but  if  her  husband  be  dead,  she  is  free  to  marry 

40  whom  she  will ;  only  in  the  Lord.  But  she  is  happier  if 
she  so  remain,  —  after  my  judgment;  and  I  think  that  I 
have  also  the  spirit  of  God. 


We  enter  now  on  a  new  division  of  the  Epistle. 
The  Apostle  passes  from  the  subject  of  the  doctrinal 
Dissensions  to  the  Immoralities  of  the  Corinthian 
Church,  with  a  sharpness  and  rapidity  which  serve 
to  mark  his  own  sense  of  the  intimate  connection 
between  dogmatical  presumption,  spiritual  pride,  and 
practical  remissness.  Indeed,  this  very  connection 
affords  him  the  link  of  transition  which  conducts 
him  from  the  one  subject  to  the  other,  —  and  this 
appeal  to  their  Sins  may  be  regarded  as  the  con- 
clusive argument  against  their  speculative  Chris- 
tianity. It  is  impossible,  even  in  an  argumentative 
view,  to  administer  to  that  spirit  which  places  the 
essence  of  Christianity  in  some  superiority  of  spec- 


I.    COR.    CHAFS.    V.  ~VII.  85 

ulative  Doctrine,  a  more  humiliating  and  crushing 
overthrow,  than  the  moral  test  of  the  presence  or 
absence  of  the'  purifying  spirit  of  Christ,  honestly 
applied  to  all  such  Orthodoxies,  —  than  to  be  able  to 
say  to  any  man  or  Church,  "  Whilst  you  are  pre- 
suming to  build  up  an  intellectual  infallibility,  there 
is  moral  corruption  ivithin  you,  —  your  heart  and  life 
are  stained  and  guilty ;  —  and  is  it  for  you,  who  in 
the  inward  springs  of  your  practical  being  have  no 
fellowship  with  Christ,  to  determine  for  others  the 
essence  of  Salvation,  —  or  to  claim  it  as  your  own  "  ? 
This  is  the  condemning  proof  used  by  St.  Paul  in  the 
first  two  verses  of  the  fifth  chapter :  "  It  is  well 
known  that  there  is  impurity  in  the  midst  of  you,  — 
and  yet  you  are  the  men  who  boast  of  your  advanced 
views  of  Christian  Truth, — instead  of  giving  your- 
selves to  prayers  and  tears,  that  the  evil  thing  might 
be  removed  from  among  you :  your  boasting  is  not 
good."  In  the  clause  "  and  you  are  puffed  ^ip,"  the 
Greek  of  the  original  throws  a  concentrated  and 
scornful  emphasis  on  the  word  "  you,"  which,  with- 
out tones  or  paraphrase,  our  language  has  not  the 
power  of  expressing. 

There  is,  in  all  minds  not  chastened  by  the 
spiritual  symmetry  of  the  Gospel,  a  tendency  to 
substitute  some  favorite  idea,  strongly  and  vividly 
conceived,  for  the  completed  circle  of  important 
Truth.  Not  in  relation  to  other  men's  opinions 
alone,  but  even  within  the  sphere  of  our  own,  we 
are  partisans, —  singling  out  our  favorites,  casting 
into  them  our  whole  strength,  determining  them  to 
be   the   sole  essentials,  making  them  captains  over 


86  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

the  life  and  the  mind.  In  this  way  you  will  often 
find  a  man,  or  a  society,  living  for  a  time  under  the 
dominion  of  a  Thought,  or  a  View,  wholly  given  up 
to  it,  and  only  after  a  total  exhaustion  of  whatever 
reality  or  power  may  be  in  it,  as  a  child  exhausts 
his  childhood,  lapsing  from  its  control  to  pass  under 
the  same  r.bsolute  subjection  to  the  *next  dominant 
conception.  "  The  one  thing  needful "  with  such  men 
has  indeed  no  long  or  perennial  reign,  but  they  are 
always  under  the  fascination,  and  passing  through 
the  stages,  of  some  new  mental  birth,  which  for  the 
time  is  "  the  one  thing  needful."  Such  minds  do 
not  belong  to  the  highest  class,  either  of  moral  or 
of  intellectual  natures,  —  nor  have  the  Societies  on 
which  they  impress  their  own  characteristics  any 
thing  of  a  cathohc  spirit ;  but  they  are  fiften  vivid, 
impulsive,  and  graphic;  and  they  exert  great  in- 
fluence on  the  less  strongly  marked  of  their  fellow- 
men, —  on  the  temporary  mental  states  of  a  Com- 
munity, through  the  very  force  and  singleness  with 
which  they  seize  and  depict  some  partial  idea.  They 
never  give  you  complete  views;  but  for  this  very 
reason  there  is  no  confusion  in  the  mental  image 
they  present ;  —  and  since  the  singleness  of  one  as- 
pect of  Truth  is  not  interfered  with  by  another  and  a 
quahfying  one,  they  cut  as  with  a  diamond  on  the 
brain.  The  greater  minds  are  deprived,  by  the  very 
largeness  of  their  views,  of  the  use  of  this  graphic 
power.  The  number  of  the  elements  which  they  com- 
bine -.nd  blend  in  a  perfect  Truth  destroys  that 
singleness  of  impression  which  is  so  often  the  effect 
of  one-sidedness  and  of  exaggeration.     There  is  this 


I.   COR.   CHAPS.    V. -vir.  87 

compensation  in  all  the  gifts  of  God.  The  infe- 
rior talents  are  often  of  the  readiest  usury.  The 
great  minds  can  never  be  the  immediately  popular 
ones,  except  in  some  limited  department  of  thought, 
to  a  smaller  public  ;  —  their  light  is  too  broad  for 
that,  —  it  flows  from  them  with  the  quietness  of  Na- 
ture's midday  fulness,  and  does  not  impinge,  like 
a  fiery  arrow,  on  the  mental  eye.  Yet  this  partial 
and  graphic  form  of  mind,  though  an  unsafe  guide 
for  others,  is,  in  itself  considered,  a  higher  instrument 
of  God  than  that  sluggish  intellectuality,  which,  be- 
cause it  sees  the  defects  and  incompleteness  of  every 
view,  has  earnest  sympathy  with  none,  loves  nothing 
with  a  cordial  heart,  does  nothing  with  the  invin- 
cible might  of  a  surrendered  and  unhesitating  spirit, 
—  is  so  doubtful,  and  so  unsatisfied  with  every 
thing,  that  the  hour  of  action,  of  free,  unconstrained 
service,  in  entire  trust  of  heart,  to  God  and  man, 
never  comes  to  it ;  —  and  instead  of  passing  from 
Saul  the  Jewish  Zealot,  to  Paul  the  Christian  Apos- 
tle, it  remains  for  ever  the  undevout  Gallio  "who 
cares  for  none  of  these  things." 

The  great  Evil,  however,  takes  place  when  this 
passionate  and  partial  form  of  mind,  which  in  the 
individual,  if  left  free,  is  sure  to  exhaust  itself,  and 
pass  on  to  nobler  stages,  becomes  incorporated  in  a 
fixed  System,  and  is  made  the  outward  bond  of  a 
Community,  —  when,  arrested  by  the  sudden  pa- 
ralysis of  Creed  or  Church,  denied  the  after  develop- 
ments which  Nature  would  provide  for  the  individ- 
ual mind,  and  petrified  at  some  elemental  stage,  it  is 
entailed  upon  posterity  as  the  fall  symmetry  of  Truth. 


OO  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

This  fond  clinging  to  the  dominant  idea  of  a  Time, 
and  eagerness  to  enthrone  it  for  ever  over  the  world 
of  souls,  falls  in  with  the  indolence  of  human  nature, 
with  an  impatient  demand  for  System  that  relieves 
from  progress,  and  with  the  passionate  tendencies 
with  which  men  attach  themselves  to  standards 
under  which  they  have  long  been  formed  into  So- 
cieties, and  acted  in  corporate  capacities.  Under 
this  weight  of  hereditary  fidelity  to  a  given  Stand- 
ard, there  is  no  chance  of  sudden  emancipation 
for  the  Society  as  a  whole :  —  and  if  the  associa- 
tions formed  under  it  have  been  coextensive  with  an 
entire  People,  individuals  often  struggle  in  vain,  and 
minds,  that,  if  left  unfettered,  would  have  gone  re- 
joicing on  their  way  through  a  succession  of  higher 
births  of  the  soul,  sink  prostrate  beneath  its  Rule. 

The  early  Christians  were  not  preserved  from  the 
common  tendencies  of  Human  Nature.  Like  other 
partial,  and  eager,  minds,  they  seized  npon  leading' 
points^  and,  in  the  exclusive  interest  attached  to  them, 
dropped  out  of  view  coordinate  Truths.  We  find  in 
the  early  Church  two  extremes,  decidedly  opposed 
to  each  other,  but  equally  removed,  in  their  opposite 
directions,  from  the  spiritual  Rule  of  the  Gospel : 
—  +hose  who  had  their  ideas  of  a  Religion  formed 
on  the  model  of  the  Jewish  Law,  and  never  could 
emancipate  themselves  from  the  habit  of  allegiance 
to  external  authority  and  positive  enactment,  nor  re- 
ceive with  any  profound  feeling  of  its  reality  the  great 
doctrine,  that  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  is  within  the 
soul ;  —  and  those  whose  heathen  and  philosophic 
tendencies  led  them  to  interpret  this  freedom  from 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V.  -  VII.  89 

Law  in  an  immoral  sense,  —  and  to  confound  the 
Liberty  of  the  Gospel  with  the  Antinomian  doctrine 
that  the  soul  was  independent  of  the  impurities  of 
the  body,  and  was  in  fact  elevated  to  higher  per- 
fection if  it  could  dwell  apart,  in  a  cool  region  of  its 
own,  whilst  it  surrendered  the  physical  nature  to  its 
native  Evil,  and  placed  it  under  no  moral  restraint. 
The  first  of  these  extremes,  or  the  Jewish  type  of 
Christians,  we  find  most  distinctly  characterized  in 
the  Epistles  to  the  Romans  and  to  the  Galatians. 
The  latter,  the  Antinomian  type  of  Christians,  are 
very  distinctly  alluded  to  in  the  chapter  on  Corin- 
thian morals  now  before  us,  —  and  in  the  Epistles  of 
St.  John.  For  the  true  type  of  the  Christian,  the 
genuine  subject  of  a  Heavenly  Kingdom,  we  must 
look  to  the  Son  of  God,  who  felt  the  full  force  of 
the  filial  relation,  and  was  the  willing  subject  of 
paternal  rule,  —  who  destroyed  the  Law  by  fulfilling 
it,  by  spiritualizing  and  expanding  it,  imparting  to 
it,  from  the  unmeasured  love  within,  a  depth  and 
fulness  of  meaning  which  no  outward  Law  can  be 
made  to  express;  —  and  they  alone  are  his  subjects, 
modelled  in  his  spiritual  image,  in  the  fellowship  of 
his  spirit,  who  have  the  springs  of  all  holy  living 
in  the  inward  fountains  of  divine  affections,  —  and, 
bound  not  by  Law,  but  by  Love,  have  their  Blessed- 
ness in  Obedience,  and  seek  the  Righteousness  of 
God,  even  the  Righteousness  that  is  born  of  filial 
Faith. 

St.  Paul's  Corinthian  converts,  led  by  the  specu- 
lative tendencies  of  their  philosophic  schools,  and 
not  preserved  from  that  human  weakness  which,  in 


90  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

its  exclusive  estimate  of  one  class  of  interests,  de- 
preciates and  neglects  all  others,  adopted  the  dog- 
matical, instead  of  the  spiritual  type  of  Christianity, 
and,  whilst  boasting  the  superiority  of  their  Views, 
turned  away  the  earnest  eye  of  Christian  regard 
from  the  impurity  of  their  Lives.  If  men  place  the 
essence  of  Christianity  in  correctness  of  Opinion, 
they  will  involuntarily,  and  in  spite  of  themselves,  re- 
gard as  less  essential  inward  communion  with  God, 
and  holiness  of  heart  and  life.  This  arises  from 
no  turpitude  of  the  will,  but  from  the  natural  condi- 
tions of  limitation, — the  tendency  to  exclusiveness, 
under  which  all  human  faculties  are  constrained 
to  work,  —  and  of  which  it  is  the  part  of  wisdom 
to  cultivate  a  profound  and  solemn  consciousness. 
Christianity  has  perhaps  in  no  respect  conferred  a 
greater  blessing  on  the  world,  than  in  the  sense  of 
importance  it  has  attached  to  speculative  Truth,  — 
destroying  all  such  indifference  as  was  betrayed 
in  Pilate's  memorable  question,  and  imparting  an 
earnest  and  solemn  tone  to  the  deep  convictions 
of  the  heart.  But  unquestionably  this  blessing-  has 
hitherto  been  purchased  at  a  great  expense  to  Chris- 
tian charity,  and  to  the  sense  of  the  supreme  impor- 
tance of  the  purely  spiritual  sources  of  Virtue  and 
Piety,  —  and  at  present  the  profoundest  want  of  the 
Christian  world  is  some  form  of  our  Religion  which 
will  unite  this  supreme  attachment  to  the  spiritual 
faith  of  the  Heart  with  a  just  sense  of  the  undeniable 
importance  of  speculative  Truth,  —  to  make  peace 
between  the  moral  and  the  intellectual  elements  of 
our   nature,  and  to  educate   us  into   harmony,  not 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V. -VII.  91 

only  with  the  affections,  but  with  the  mind  of  God. 
And  who,  that  has  any  clear  consciousness  of  this 
deep  want,  can  doubt  that  God  is  preparing  to  sup- 
ply it,  and  from  the  long  ferment  of  its  elements, 
and  the  exclusive  development  of  some  portions  of 
its  principles,  that  a  full  and  perfect  Christianity,  to 
rise  at  length  out  of  mixed  agencies,  to  combine  all 
partial  truths,  and  to  reconcile  the  warring  world,  is 
in  the  purpose  of  His  providence  ?  And  with  this 
view  we  mitigate  our  religious  animdsities  ;  for,  par- 
tial and  incomplete  as  we  all  are,  we  learn  to  per- 
ceive that  tendencies  the  most  opposite  to  our  own, 
may  yet  contribute  something  to  the  perfect  form  of 
Truth,  the  full  and  unmutilated  Christianity  which, 
uniting  all  real  elements  of  Grace  and  Power,  will 
appear  at  last,  to  explain  the  Past,  and  reconcile  the 
Future. 

The  immoral  tendencies  and  perplexities  of  the 
Corinthian  Church,  in  contrast  with  their  high  spec- 
ulative pretensions,  which  are  described  in  the  fifth, 
sixth,  and  seventh  chapters,  we  shall  now  enumer- 
ate, noticing  w^hatever  difficulties  may  occur  in  the 
Apostle's  treatment  of  these  subjects. 

I.  He  charges  them  with  the  scandal  to  Chris- 
tianity, of  retaining  within  its  nominal  communion  a 
person  notoriously  guilty  of  leading  an  impure  life. 
St.  Paul,  in  this  and  in  some  other  cases,  advised 
excommunication,  —  but  it  was  always  the  excom- 
munication of  immorality,  and  never  of  heresy.  In 
this  respect  the  Church  has  precisely  reversed  the 
practice  of  the  Apostle,  always  excommunicating  for 


92  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

heresy,  and  never  for  immorality.  It  is  evident  that 
infant  and  nascent  Christianity,  professing  to  exhibit 
a  Kingdom  of  God  upon  the  Earth,  with  its  handful 
of  disciples  scattered  in  the  midst  of  a  Universal 
Heathenism,  could  prevail  only  through  a  true  Chris- 
tian power  breathed  forth  from  the  lives  of  holy  and 
devoted  men,  —  that  the  salt  of  the  earth  must  be 
true  salt,  and  not  unsound  itself,  —  and  that  to  let  a 
Heathen  man,  with  a  heathen  heart  and  a  heathen 
life,  be  pointed'at  as  an  example  of  a  Christian,  was 
at  once  to  destroy  the  Christian  peculiarity,  and  to 
confuse  the  Kingdom  of  Satan  with  the  Kingdom 
of  God.  St.  Paul  claims  no  jurisdiction  over  those 
that  were  without :  he  says  that  it  was  not  for  him 
to  pass  judgment  on  a  heathen  man,  —  let  God  judge 
him ;  but  if  any  man  professed  himself  a  Christian 
brother,  and  joined  himself  to  the  small  band  of 
Christ's  representatives  on  earth,  and  then  brought 
disgrace  on  them  by  a  scandalous  life,  —  with  that 
man  he  could  have  no  association,  —  "  no,  not  even 
to  eat."  If  he  acted  in  Satan's  spirit,  let  him  take 
his  place  on  Satan's  side  ;  but  why  should  one  of 
the  adversary's  force,  one  of  Satan's  friends,  be  ad- 
mitted, or  openly  retained,  within  the  camp  of  the 
Lord  ?  Let  the  contamination  be  removed ;  let  him 
be  taught  his  true  place  among  Satan's  followers, 
that,  if  there  is  any  vestige  of  grace  in  his  heart,  he 
may  be  awakened  to  self-knowledge,  and  that  by 
the  present  suffering  of  remorse  his  spirit  may  be 
saved  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  That  by  "  Sa- 
tan "  no  allusion  was  intended  to  any  infernal  Prin- 
ciple  or    Power,  is   very  evident  from  the  purpose 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V.  -  VII.  93 

which  this  committal  to  Satan  was  to  serve,  —  "  that 
the  spirit  might  be  saved."  And  we  find  exactly  the 
same  use  of  the  expression  —  viz.  assigning  a  man 
to  the  adversary's  party,  to  the  worldly  side,  if  his 
life  was  worldly,  —  and  for  the  same  remedial  pur- 
pose, —  that  he  might  be  awakened  to  a  knowledge 
of  his  gross  inconsistency  —  in  1  Tim.  i.  20 ;  when 
St.  Paul,  speaking  of  nominal  Christians  who  had 
made  utter  shipwreck  of  conscience,  adds,  "  of  whom 
is  HymensBus  and  Alexander ;  whom  I  have  deliv- 
ered unto  Satan,  that  they  may  learn  not  to  blas- 
pheme." It  is  clear  that  the  conception  was  that  of 
two  hostile  Kingdoms,  struggling  for  dominion  on 
the  earth,  and  that  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  must 
not  be  weakened  by  communion  with  the  allies 
of  Satan,  —  and  that  these  treacherous  and  fatal 
friends,  if  made  to  feel  that  their  lives  were  against 
the  Lord,  that  they  were  serving  one  cause  whilst 
professing  another,  might  be  stirred  unto  repent- 
ance. This,  indeed,  is  the  essential  idea  that  the 
Jews  connected  with  Satan,  —  that  of  a  tester  and 
searcher  of  the  spirits  of  men,  with  the  probationary 
purpose  of  ascertaining,  or  confirming,  their  loyalty 
to  conscience  and  to  God.  "  Satan  hath  desired  to 
have  thee,"  says  our  Lord  to  Peter,  "  that  he  may 
sift  thee  as  wheat."  "  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan," 
is  his  reply  to  the  same  Apostle,  when  he  suggested 
the  worldly  view  of  Messiah's  kingdom.  In  the 
Book  of  Job,  Satan  is  described  as  one  of  the  an- 
gels of  the  Lord,  whose  function  it  was  to  prove  by 
trial  the  hearts  of  men  :  —  "  Now  there  was  a  day 
when  the  Sons  of  God  came  to  present  themselves 


94  FIRST    E^»ISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

before  the  Lord,  and  Satan  came  among  them.  And 
the  Lord  said  unto  Satan,  '  Whence  comest  thou  ?  ' 
Then  Satan  answered  the  Lord  and  said,  '  From 
going  to  and  fro  on  the  earth,  and  from  walking  up 
and  down  in  it.'  And  the  Lord  said  unto  Satan, 
*  Hast  thou  considered  my  servant  Job,  that  there  is 
none  like  him  in  the  earth,  a  perfect  and  an  upright 
man,  one  that  feareth  God,  and  escheweth  evil  ?  ' 
Then  Satan  answered  the  Lord  and  said,  '  Doth  Job 
fear  God  for  naught  ?  Hast  thou  not  made  a  hedge 
about  him  and  about  his  house,  and  about  all  that 
he  hath  on  every  side  ?  Thou  hast  blessed  the 
work  of  his  hands,  and  his  substance  is  increased  in 
the  land.  But  put  forth  thine  hand  now,  and  touch 
all  that  he  hath,  and  he  will  curse  thee  to  thy 
face.'  And  the  Lord  said  unto  Satan,  '  Behold,  all 
that  he  hath  is  in  thy  power,  —  only  upon  himself 
put  not  forth  thine  hand.'  So  Satan  went  forth 
from  the  presence  of  the  Lord." 

When  St.  Paul  urges  the  Corinthians  to  reject 
from  the  Christian  Association  the  impure  person, 
he  employs  the  illustration,  that  "  a  little  leaven 
leaveneth  the  whole  lump  "  ;  —  and  following  out  the 
figure,  he  conceives  of  Christianity  as  the  everlast- 
ing Festival  of  purity,  when  the  old  leaven  was  to 
be  cast  away  for  ever,  and  the  unleavened  bread  of 
simplicity  and  truth,  through  an  everlasting  Pass- 
over, was  to  be  the  heavenly  bread  of  life  to  the 
delivered  of  the  Lord.  The  death  of  Christ  dated 
the  Era  of  Deliverance  :  the  Passover  is  slain,  —  let 
nothing  of  the  leaven  of  slavery  and  sin  be  found 
among  the  Lord's  freemen.     I  know  not  under  what 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V. -VII.  95 

strange  misunderstanding  this  beautiful  image  can 
be  applied  to  the  common  doctrine  of  the  Atonement. 
The  Passover  marked  a  season  of  DeUverance, — 
and  annually  at  the  commemorating  Feast  the  Jews 
cleansed  their  houses,  and  for  eight  days  used  only 
unleavened  Bread.  The  Lamb  slain  on  the  occasion 
was  not  a  sacrifice  in  any  sense ;  it  was  a  commem- 
orative emblem  of  the  Blood  on  the  lintel,  which 
the  Destroying  Angel  observed,  and  left  the  house 
unscathed.  And  when  Christ  brought  Deliverance 
from  sin,  and  led  the  way  to  a  heavenly  Canaan, 
the  Festival  of  Purity  was  to  last /or  ever,  the  leaven 
of  malice  and  wickedness  was  never  to  ferment  in 
Christian  homes  or  hearts  again,  —  and  those  whose 
Passover  from  Heathen  slavery  commenced  with 
the  death  of  the  Lamb  of  God  (no  more  a  sacrifi- 
cial death  than  the  Lamb  of  the  Passover), —  their 
relations  to  whom  were  now  unbroken  in  the  pure 
Heavens,  spiritual  and  immortal,  —  were  to  keep  for 
ever  the  Festival  of  Sacredness,  and  to  have  no  more 
fellowship  with  the  old  Leaven,  but  to  live  as  New 
Creatures,  members  of  a  Heavenly  Kingdom. 

II.  In  the  sixth  chapter,  St.  Paul  exposes  the 
utter  violation  of  the  Idea  of  a  Christian  Community 
implied  in  the  injurious  and  litigious  spirit,  that,  in 
the  first  place,  could  give  cause  for  the  interference 
of  the  Law,  —  and  in  the  second,  through  the  weak- 
ness of  brotherly  love,  require  the  settlement  of  dif- 
ferences to  be  referred  to  the  Heathen  Tribunals. 
There  was  a  double  evil  here ;  —  the  absence  of  the 
Christian  bond  in  their  own  hearts,  and  the  injury 


96  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

they  inflicted  on  the  cause  of  Christ,  by  failing  to 
hold  before  the  world  the  realized  Image  of  a  Chris- 
tian Brotherhood.  The  Kingdom  of  God  on  Earth, 
the  Reign  of  Love  and  Holiness,  was  as  manifestly 
set  at  naught,  and  in  the  individual  case  proclaimed 
a  failure,  by  the  violation  of  its  Peace,  as  by  the 
violation  of  its  Purity.  It  was  too  evident,  that  nei- 
ther the  litigious,  nor  the  unholy,  had  established  a 
Kingdom  of  Heaven. 

In  our  Translation  the  fourth  verse  of  the  sixth 
chapter  is  unintelligible :  "  If,  then,  ye  have  judg- 
ments of  things  pertaining  to  this  life,  set  them 
to  judge  who  are  least  esteemed  in  the  Church." 
Paul's  meaning  seems  to  have  been :  "  If,  then,  ye 
have  matters  of  judgment  amongst  yourselves,  about 
affairs  relating  to  common  life,  —  do  ye  call  in,  to 
judge  between  you,  those  [unbelievers]  who  have  no 
place  in  the  Christian  community?  I  speak  this  to 
your  shame." 

In  the  moral  reasonings  which  St.  Paul  ascribes 
to  the  Corinthians,  from  the  twelfth  verse  to  the  end 
of  the  eleventh  chapter,  there  are  the  distinct  sugges- 
tions of  an  Antinomian  spirit.  St.  Paul,  as  his  cus- 
tom is,  meets  all  such  gross  sophistry,  such  scan- 
dalous falsifications  of  the  Liberty  of  the  Gospel, 
by  an  appeal  to  first  principles :  "  What  did  you 
profess,  when  you  became  Christians?  To  yield  up 
your  members  to  Christ,  as  instruments  to  work  in 
his  spirit,  and  do  his  will.  What  did  you  lay  aside, 
when  you  professed  Christ  as  your  Master?  The 
mastery  over  yourselves.  You  are  not  your  own  ; 
your  Master  is  in   heaven,  —  and  a  holy  spirit  must 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V. -VII.  97 

rule  you.  Know  ye  not  that  your  bodies  are  mem- 
bers of  Christ,  —  and  he  that  is  united  with  the  Lord 
must  be  of  one  spirit  with  him  ?  Know  ye  not  that 
your  body  is  the  Temple  of  the  Holy  Spirit  which 
is  in  you,  which  ye  have  fvom  God,  —  and  that  ye 
are  not  your  own?  —  therefore,  glorify  God  in  your 
body." 

Even  in  matters  of  indifference  in  themselves,  St. 
Paul  maintains  that  Christian  Liberty  is  a  great  re- 
sponsibility, which  must  be  exercised  under  two  con- 
ditions :  that  we  infringe  the  Liberty  of  none,  — 
and  that  at  no  moment,  by  indulgence  in  things  in- 
different, shall  we  be  deprived  of  the  mastery  over 
our  faculties,  or  be  incapacitated  for  the  severest 
Christian  service.  "  Indifferent  things  are  lawful 
for  me :  but  they  may  be  inexpedient.  Indifferent 
things  are  lawful  for  me :  hut  I  ivill  not  he  enslaved 
by  any  thing.''''  How  much  are  we  all  enslaved  by 
enemies,  that  seem  too  trivial  for  the  energy  of  Con- 
science to  rise  in  its  awfulness  and  slay!  Petty 
weaknesses,  and  loose  habits,  creep  over  us  and  bind 
our  giant  strength.  Small  cares,  some  deficiencies 
in  the  mere  arrangement  and  ordering  of  our  lives, 
daily  fret  our  hearts,  and  cross  the  clearness  of  our 
faculties ;  and  these  entanglements  hang  around  us, 
and  leave  us  no  free  soul  able  to  give  itself  up,  in 
power  and  gladness,  to  the  true  work  of  life.  There 
is  the  profoundest  moral  truth  in  that  doctrine  of  St. 
Paul's,  that  entire  mastery  over  the  physical  nature 
is  the  only  basis  from  which  all  the  higher  power  of 
character  must  proceed.  The  severest  training  and 
self-denial,  —  a  superiority  to  the  servitude  of  indul- 

9 


98  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

gence,  —  are  the  indispensable  conditions  even  of 
genial  spirits,  of  unclouded  energies,  of  tempers  free 
from  morbidness,  —  much  more  of  the  practised  and 
vigorous  mind,  ready  at  every  call,  and  thoroughly 
furnished  unto  all  good  works.  In  the  lassitude  and 
indulgence  by  which  we  deprive  the  soul  of  this 
physical  fitness  and  freedom,  many  of  us  greatly 
sin; — nor  is  there  a  spiritual  counsel  that  ought 
daily  to  penetrate  the  soul  with  more  solemn  tone 
than  that  high  resolve  of  Christ's  freeman,  —  I  will 
not  be  brought  under  the  power  of  any  thing." 

III.  It  could  not  but  happen  in  the  circumstances 
of  the  Early  Church,  that  great  anxiety  and  perplex- 
ity should  arise  in  connection  with  the  domestic  re- 
lations. Ought  a  man,  whom  Persecution  might  at 
any  moment  leave  no  home  upon  the  earth,  to  in- 
volve others  in  these  trials  of  his  faith  ?  Must  not 
the  Cross  be  borne  alone,  rather  than  "  a  sword  pierce 
through  the  soul  "  of  family  and  kindred  ?  Again, 
in  the  case  of  domestic  relations  already  existing,  if 
only  one  of  the  parties  should  be  converted  to  the 
Gospel,  how  could  that  intimate  communion  of 
thought  and  spirit,  without  which  the  relation  is  a 
practical  falsehood,  subsist  between  a  Christian  and 
an  Idolater  ?  Did  the  spiritual  change  dissolve  the 
temporal  relation,  in  which  there  was  no  longer  a 
soul  of  Truth  ?  St.  Paul  gives  his  judgment  on 
these  points,  which  seem  to  have  been  brought  be- 
fore him  in  the  form  of  questions  by  a  Letter  from 
the  Cca'inthians,  in  the  seventh  chapter.  His  an- 
swers are  avowedly  given,  in  relation  to  the  tempo- 
rary circumstances  of  an  infant  Religion  struggling 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    V. -VII.  99 

for  existence,  and  demanding  the  complete  self-sac- 
rifice of  its  first  members,  —  and  are  framed,  not 
TLipon  unchanging  principles,  or  laws  of  the  Moral 
Nature,  but  upon  considerations  of  present  wisdom 
and  expediency.  He  leans  to  the  side  of  freedom 
from  care  and  private  relations  ;  and  in  a  case  where 
fidelity  to  God  and  the  domestic  affections  would 
cross,  and  make  for  each  other  severe  temptations, 
he  would  be  for  giving  no  "  hostages  to  Fortune." 
But  he  confesses  that  this  was  only  what  he  deemed 
best  for  himself,  and  that  he  was  no  Law  for  others : 
"For  every  one  hath  his  oivn  gift  from  God;  one 
after  this  manner,  and  another  after  that."  The  cir- 
cumstances in  which  a  man  works  out  his  mission 
of  faithfulness  to  his  highest  convictions,  may  be  of 
any  nature  whatever,  if  in  them  that  faithfulness  is 
preserved,  and  the  spirit  of  Truth  and  Duty  honest- 
ly wrought  into  outward  expression.  This  was  the 
noble  Principle  which  Christ's  Apostles  announced, 
for  the  guidance  of  the  Church  in  the  most  critical 
times.  The  spirit  of  Christianity  is  strong  enough 
to  sustain  itself  and  sanctify  Life,  under  any  out- 
ward relations.  Fret  not  against  the  .outward  Cir- 
cumstance, but  take  up  its  burden  with  a  Christian 
heart,  —  and  the  right  soul  will,  in  time,  put  all 
things  right,  and  spiritually  adjust  the  relations  of 
life  :  —  "  Art  thou  called,  being  a  Slave  ?  Deem  that 
your  obedience  is  paid  to  God,  —  and  care  not  for 
it;  receive  your  external  relations  as  from  God, — 
for  both  the  slave  and  the  freeman  are  the  servants 
of  the  Lord,  —  and  he  is  the  noblest  who  is  faithful 
to  his  spiritual  Master  at  the  severest  post."  If 
Slavery  was  doomed  to  pass  away  before  the  Chris- 


100  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tian  sentiment,  every  slave  sustaining  his  liard  rela- 
tions in  a  Christian  spirit,  was  exhibiting  the  inhe- 
rent equality  of  all  humanity,  and  emancipating  the 
world.  "  Art  thou  called  in  circumcision,  or  in  un- 
circumcision  ?  Circumcision  is  nothing,  and  uncir- 
cumcision  is  nothing ;  —  but  the  keeping  of  the  com- 
mandments of  God."  "  Art  thou  called,  having  an 
unbelieving  husband  ?  Desert  not  thine  own  faith 
for  him,  —  but  sanctify  him  with  thy  believing  mind. 
Brethren,  let  every  one  remain  with  God,  in  that 
state  in  which  he  was  called." 

All  external  relations  are  alike  to  those  who  in 
them  make  no  shipwreck  of  faith  and  conscience. 
Only,  let  no  man's  soul  settle  down  upon  present 
things,  or  fail  to  see  that  the  essence  of  Joy,  as  of 
Duty,  has  no  abode  on  earth,  and,  being  divine  and 
eternal,  must  soon  change  its  transient  form  to  in- 
herit its  imperishable  substance.  The  essential  char- 
acter of  joys  and  sorrows  springing  out  of  temporal 
relations  is  their  transitoriness,  —  the  essence  of  all 
spiritual  bonds  is  their  preservation  by  God,  —  their 
immortality  with  Him  in  the  infinite  world.  "  But 
this  I  say,  brethren,  Whatever  be  your  outward 
relations,  —  the  time  is  short;  —  it  remaineth,  that 
both  they  that  have  wives  be  as  though  they  had 
none,  —  and  they  that  weep,  as  though  they  w^ept 
not  (as  though  God  had  already  dried  their  tears), 
—  and  they  that  rejoice,  as  though  they  rejoiced  not, 
sitting  loose  to  life,  —  and  they  that  buy,  as  though 
they  possessed  not,  —  and  they  that  use  this  world 
as  not  abusing  it :  for  the  fashion  of  this  world  pass- 
eth  away:  and  I  would  have  you  to  be  without 
vain  anxiety."  (vii.  29,  31.) 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.   VIII. 5  IX.  101 


SECTION    II. 


perplexities  and  perils  to  the  recent  converts  to 
christianity,  from  the  connection  of  gentile  man- 
ners    with    idolatrous   observances. knowledge 

without   love  no  principle  of  christian  action. 

Paul's  appeal  to  his  own  example  of   forbearance 
from  lawful  things  for  the  sake  of  others. 


CHAPS.   VIII.,  IX. 


VIII.    1.     Now  concerning  things  offered  unto  idols,   '  we 
know  ' ;  for  we  all  have  knowledge.     Knowledge  puffeth 

2  up  ;  but  charity  buildeth  up.  And  if  any  one  think  that 
he  knoweth  any  thing,  he   knoweth  nothing  yet  as  he 

3  ought  to  know.     But  if  any  one  loveth  God,  the  same  is 

4  known  of  Him.  As  concerning  therefore  the  eating  of 
things  offered  in  sacrifice  unto  idols,  '  we  know  that  an 
idol  is  nothing  in  the  world,  and  that  there  is  no  other 

5  God  but  one.  For  though  there  be  that  are  called  gods, 
whether  in  heaven  or  in  earth  (as  there  are  gods  many, 

6  and  lords  many),  yet  to  us  there  is  one  God,  the  Father, 
of  whom  are  all  things,  and  we  in  Him,  and  one  Lord, 
Jesus  Christ,  through  whom  are  all  things,  and  we  through 

7  him.'  But  there  is  not  in  all  this  knowledge  :  for  some, 
with  a  consciousness  of  the  idol,  to  this  hour  eat  as  of 
what  was  offered  to  an  idol,  and  their  conscience  being 


102  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

8  weak  is  defiled.  *  But  meat  commendeth  us  not  to  God  ; 
for  neither,  if  we  eat,   are  we  the  better ;  nor,  if  we  eat 

9  not,  are  we  the  worse.'  But  see  to  it,  lest  by  any  means 
this  Hberty  of  yours  become  an  occasion  of  sin  to  them 

10  that  are  weak.  For  if  any  one  see  thee,  who  hast  knowl- 
edge, at  table  in  an  idol's  temple,  shall  not  the  conscience 
of  him  who  is  weak  be  emboldened  to  eat  the  things  of- 

11  fered  to  idols  ?     And  through  thy  knowledge,  the  weak 

12  brother  for  whom  Christ  died  shall  perish.  But  when  ye 
thus  sin  against  the  brethren,  and  wound  their  weak  con- 

13  science,  ye  sin  against  Christ.  Wherefore,  if  meat  make 
my  brother  to  sin,  I  will  never  more  eat  flesh,  lest  I  make 
my  brother  to  sin. 

IX.  1.  Am  I  not  free  ?  Am  I  not  an  Apostle  ?  Have  I 
not  seen  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord  ?     Are  not  ye  my  work  in 

2  the  Lord  ?  If  to  others  I  am  not  an  Apostle,  at  least  I 
am  to  you,  for  ye  are  the  seal  of  my  Apostleship  in  the 

3  Lord.     My  answer  to  those  who  question  me  is  this  : 

4  Have  not  we  privilege  to  eat  and  to  drink  ?     Have  not 

5  we  privilege  to  take  one  of  the  sisters  to  wife,  as  well  as 
the  other  Apostles,  and  the  brethren  of  the  Lord,  and  Ce- 

6  phas  ?     Or  have  I  and  Barnabas,  only,  no  privilege  to 

7  abstain  from  working  ?  Who  ever  serveth  in  war  at  his 
own  charges  ?  Who  planteth  a  vineyard,  and  eateth  not 
of  its  fruit  ?  or  who  tendeth  a  flock,  and  eateth  not  of 

8  the  milk  of  the  flock  ?     Say  I  these  things  as  a  man  ? 

9  or  doth  not  the  law  also  say  the  same  ?  For  it  is  writ- 
ten in  the  law  of  Moses,  "  Thou  shalt  not  muzzle  the 
ox   that  treadeth   out   the    corn."*     Is    God's  care  for 

10  oxen  ?  Or  does  he  not  say  it  altogether  for  us  ?  For 
us  it  was  written,  that  he  who  plougheth  should  plough  in 

*  Deut.  XXV.  4. 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  103 

hope,  —  and  he  that  thresheth,  in  the  hope  of  partaking. 

11  If  we  have  sown  for  you  spiritual  things,  is  it  a  great 

12  thing  if  we  reap  your  fleshly  things  ?  If  others  partake 
of  this  privilege  with  you,  shall  not  we  rather  ?  Yet  we 
have  not  used  this  privilege ;  but  we  endure  all  things, 
that  we  may  give  no  hinderance  to  the  Gospel  of  Christ. 

13  Know  ye  not  that  they  who  minister  in  holy  things  are 
fed  from  the  temple  ?  and  that  they  who  wait  at  the  altar 

14  partake  with  the  altar  ?  So  also  hath  the  Lord  ordained 
for  those  who  preach  the  Gospel,  to  live  by  the  Gospel. 

15  But  I  have  not  used  any  of  these  things  :  neither  have  I 
written  these  things  that  so  it  should  be  done  unto  me  : 
for  better  to  die  than  that  any  one  should  make  my  glo- 

16  rying  void.  For  that  I  preach  the  Gospel  is  not  my  glo- 
rying ;  for  necessity  is  laid  upon  me  ;  for  woe  is  me  if  I 

17  preach  not  the  Gospel.  For  if  I  do  this  willingly  I  have 
a  reward ;  but  if  unwillingly,   I  have  been  put  in  trust 

18  with  a  charge.  What  then  is  my  reward  ?  That,  whilst 
preaching  the  Gospel,  I  make  the  Gospel  of  Christ  with- 
out cost,  so  that  I  abuse  not  my  privilege  in  the  Gospel. 

19  For  being  free  from  all,  I  have  made  myself  the  slave  of 

20  all,  that  I  might  gain  the  more.  And  to  the  Jews  I  be- 
came as  a  Jew,  that  I  might  gain  the  Jews  ;  to  those  un- 
der the  law,  as  one  under  the  law,  not  being  myself  un- 
der the  law,  that  I  might  gain  those  who  are  under  the 

21  law  ;  to  those  without  law,  as  one  without  law  (not  being 
without  law  to  God,  but  under  law  to  Christ),  that  I  might 

22  gain  those  that  are  without  law.  To  the  weak  became  I 
as  one  weak,  that  I  might  gain  the  weak.     I  became  all 

23  things  to  all,  that  by  all  means  I  might  save  some.  And 
this  I  do  for  the  Gospel's  sake,  that  I  may  be  a  partaker 

24  in  it.  Know  ye  not  that  they  who  run  in  the  race-course 
run  all,  but  one  receiveth  the  prize  ?     So  run,  that  ye 

25  may  obtain.     And  eveiy  one  that  contendeth  in  the  games 


104  FIRST     EPISTLE     TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

is  temperate  in  all  things  :  and  they,  that  they  may  obtain 
a  corruptible  crown ;  but  we,  that  we  may  obtain  an  in- 

26  corruptible.     I  therefore  so  run,  as  not  uncertainly  ;  I  so 

27  fight,  as  not  beating  the  air  :  but  I  keep  my  body  under, 
and  bring  it  into  subjection,  lest,  having  been  a  herald  to 
others,  I  should  myself  become  dishonored. 


It  is  but  seldom  that  new  moral  Light  comes  so 
suddenly  on  the  souls  of  men,  that  it  enters  into  di- 
rect collision  with  the  existing  arrangements  of  So- 
ciety, and  requires  violent  changes  in  their  modes 
of  life.  Even  the  greatest  social  revolutions,  when 
they  come  in  the  natural  course  of  human  affairs, 
spring  from  the  inward  life  and  progress  of  Man  : 
they  are  not  sudden  bursts  of  Enthusiasm  or  new- 
born Truth,  but  the  eventual  expressions  of  senti- 
ments that  had  been  long  working  in  the  popular 
mind,  and  that,  after  silently  remodelling  standard 
modes  of  thinking,  pass  at  length  into  outward  rep- 
resentation, and  are  hvingly  reflected  in  the  Institu- 
tions, and  the  Civilization,  which  their  spirit  has 
created.  Such  natural  Revolutions,  if  ushered  into 
day  by  the  quiet  hand  of  God,  whose  preparations 
for  progress  are  in  the  silent  renovations  of  the  heart, 
and  whose  Providence  revolts  from  all  violence  of 
transition,  —  if  left  to  the  unconstrained  ebb  and 
flow  of  the  vast  human  spirit  moved  and  directed 
by  influence  and  energy  from  on  high,  —  if  not  arti- 
ficially checked  and  fretted  by  selfish  interferences 
and  class  obstructions,  —  would  no  more  disarrange 
any  existing  interest,  or  come  into  abrupt  opposition 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    Vlir.,    IX.  105 

to  any  existing  mode  of  life,  than  the  Light  of  day, 
which  reaches  its  meridian  fuhiess  without  any  hu- 
man eye  being  able  to  detect  the  momentary  grada- 
tion of  its  brightness,  enters  into  an  abrupt  struggle 
with  the  Darkness,  which  insensibly  it  conquers.  It 
is  only  the  spirit  of  individual  self-will,  seeking  to 
realize  its  own  ends  by  precipitancy  or  resistance, 
that  disturbs  for  a  time  the  quiet  flow  of  God's  ad- 
vancing providence ;  and  under  the  natural  govern- 
ment of  the  world,  there  are  no  violent  changes  in- 
troduced into  human  affairs,  or  into  the  moral  adjust- 
ments of  life,  except  those  that  spring  from  the  self- 
ish opposition  of  Individuals  to  the  directions  of  the 
general  Good,  —  from  some  powerful  Class  arrest- 
ing, for  a  brief  ancf  desperate  moment,  the  strong 
movement  of  Humanity.  Such  is  the  Law  of  God's 
natural  providence ;  —  violence  never  appears  in  it ; 
—  sudden  changes  never  take  place  in  it,  —  except 
when  forced  into  existence  by  the  selfish  opposition 
of  Individuals  to  the  general  directions  of  Mankind. 
It  might  be  supposed,  that,  in  the  times  of  a  svper- 
natural  Influence  exerted  from  on  high,  this  Law  of 
gentle  and  peaceful  transitions  would  disappear,  — 
that  Revelation,  by  its  very  nature  implying  the 
coming  of  new  Light  into  the  world,  not  born  with- 
in the  heart  but  descending  from  heaven  upon  it, 
would  at  once,  by  a  sudden  enlightening  of  the  mor- 
al nature,  throw  it  out  of  harmony  with  institutions 
and  modes  of  life  which  had  been  suited  to  its  un- 
regenerated  state,  the  products  of  its  lower  and  dark- 
er views ;  and  that  the  perception  of  new  and  purer 
moral  relations   would   require   corresponding  out- 


106 


FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


ward  adjustments,  and  lead  to  immediate  social  con- 
vulsions. We  can  imagine,  for  example,  what  vio- 
lence and  disorder  Christianity  would  have  intro- 
duced into  the  commonest  relations  of  Life,  if,  with 
a  cold  and  hard  exclusiveness,  it  had  insisted  on  an 
immediate  and  complete  harmony  in  all  outward 
things  with  the  final  results  of  its  own  principles;  — 
if,  instead  of  planting  a  new  sentiment  in  the  heart, 
the  seed  of  future  change,  and  leaving  it  to  work 
outw^ards,  as  it  acquired  fulness  and  strength  within, 
it  had  commenced  by  enforcing  the  external  Refor- 
mation ;  —  if  it  had  openly  denounced  consecrated 
observances,  instead  of  gradually  purifying  the  in- 
ward feelings  from  which  their  life  was  derived ;  — 
if  it  had  commanded  the  Slave  to  assert  his  Free- 
dom, and  by  physical  resistance  make  good  the  spir- 
itual claim ;  —  if  it  had  entered  into  the  delicate  and 
intricate  relations  of  domestic  life,  and,  regardless  of 
the  sacredness  of  existing  bonds  and  affections,  how- 
ever theoretically  imperfect,  insisted  on  an  immedi- 
ate and  forcible  adjustment  of  all  private  connec- 
tions in  harmony  with  the  purest  realizations  of  Chris- 
tian sentiment.  God  had  provided,  indeed,  against 
the  confusion  that  would  in  this  way  have  been  cre- 
ated,—  by  bringing  the  various  nations  of  the  world 
nearly  to  a  moral  level,  when  the  Fulness  of  Time 
was  come,  so  that  the  divine  light  of  the  Gospel  fell 
with  a  remarkable  uniformity  of  impression  on  the 
varied  heart  of  Man,  —  and  by  meeting  the  diversi- 
ties and  conflicts  of  moral  sentiment  that  were  pro- 
duced by  that  suddenness  of  illumination,  even  with- 
in the  Church  itself,  with  the  healing  spirit,  the  large 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  107 

wisdom,  that  flowed  out  of  the  heart  of  Christ,  and 
that  so  eminently  guided  the  administration  of  the 
great  Apostle  who  was  the  principal  agent  in  the 
establishment  of  his  Kingdom.  In  more  modern 
times,  the  history  of  Christianity  has  not  been  with- 
out exemplifications  of  the  disorder  created  by  vio- 
lent attempts  to  remodel  the  outward  life,  before  the 
Christian  sentiment  had  taken  possession  of  the  in- 
ward springs  of  action.  By  the  operation  of  Chris- 
tian Missionaries  a  state  of  circumstances  has  been 
produced,  that  has  no  parallel  in  the  times  of  the 
primitive  Church  :  the  highest  and  the  lowest  grades 
of  civilization  have  been  brought  suddenly  into  mor- 
al intercourse,  —  and,  instead  of  the  patient  heart, 
and  spiritual  eye,  of  Christ  and  Paul,  there  have  too 
often  been  the  formalism,  the  outward  exactingness, 
of  a  precisian  and  a  zealot.  No  cause  of  failure  ap- 
pears more  prominent  in  the  still  noble  history  of 
Missionary  effort,  than  an  unyielding  demand  for 
violent  changes  in  the  habits  of  social  life,  —  a  hard 
enforcement  of  the  outward  realizations  of  Christian- 
ity before  they  could  be  the  natural  fruits  of  Chris- 
tian sentiment,*  —  an  attempt  to  subdue  the  sacred- 
ness  of  Nature  in  the  savage  heart  by  the  power  of 


♦  A  horrid,  yet  ludicrous,  instance  presents  itself  in  the  Paper  of 
the  day  on  which  I  was  revising  the  MS.  of  this  page:  — 

"  Polygamy  prevails  in  New  Zealand,  and  a  Chief  with  ten  wives 
was  told  that  he  could  not  be  baptized,  unless  he  confined  himself  to  one. 
At  the  end  of  about  two  months  he  repaired  to  the  nearest  Missionary, 
and  stated  that  he  had  got  rid  of  nine.  '  Wliat  have  you  done  with 
them?'  was  the  natural  interrogatory.  *  I  have  eaten  them,' was  the 
unhesitating  reply."  —  Lecture  by  Lord  John  Manners,  Zn^'MtVer 
Newspaper,  Feb.  1,  1851. 


108  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

an  outward  Law,  —  a  cause  of  failure  that  could 
never  have  come  into  operation,  if  the  spiritual  and 
catholic  mind  of  Christ,  his  supreme  regard  for  the 
smallest  seeds  of  Life  in  the  soul,  the  grains  of  liv- 
ing Faith,  had  been  more  profoundly  sympathized 
with,  or  if  the  example  had  been  followed,  of  "  the 
Planting  and  Training  of  the  Christian  Church"  by 
the  great  Apostle. 

We  have  in  these  chapters  remarkable  examples 
of  the  practical  wisdom  of  St.  Paul ;  —  and  that  not 
the  wisdom  of  tact,  nor  of  skilful  address  in  the  man- 
agement of  difficulties,  —  but  the  wisdom  of  a  large 
and  noble  Nature,  careful  only  that  the  principles  of 
the  Christian  life  should  take  root  in  the  heart  of 
the  world,  and  undisturbed  by  small  and  unspiritual 
uneasiness  about  the  external  diversities,  in  which 
the  Individuality  of  our  nature  manifests  its  infinite 
Variety.  There  was,  in  fact,  a  truthfulness  in  Paul's 
mind,  that  made  him  very  patient  of  the  slow  and 
imperfect  developments  of  Christian  principles.  He 
would  not  have  accepted  outward  realizations  of  the 
Christian  spirit,  unless  they  had  been  forced  into  life 
by  the  genuine  demands  of  the  heart ;  —  and  the 
broken  surface  of  the  Christian  world  when  the  Light 
of  Christ's  mind  first  penetrated  the  moralities  of 
Heathen  and  Jewish  sentiment,  the  differences  of 
form  and  degree  in  which  it  rent  men  from  their  old 
usages,  in  proportion  to  their  moral  susceptibility, 
showed  the  genuine  truth  and  energy  of  the  new 
Influence, — and  that  the  Christian  spirit  had  kin- 
dled its  own  fire  in  each  separate  breast. 

We  are  presented  here  with  the  nearest  approach 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  109 

that  the  early  records  of  Christianity  contain,  to  a 
history  of  the  unavoidable  collisions  between  the 
new  modes  of  Life  required  by  the  Gospel,  and  the 
old  usages  which  affection,  and  even  conscience,  had 
long  hallowed  and  endeared.  We  find  ourselves 
in  the  midst  of  a  warfare  of  IdeS-s  :  —  Light  from 
God  has  suddenly  fallen  on  the  confirmed  habits  of 
a  people,  —  and  the  forms  of  a  higher  civilization 
and  of  a  spiritual  worship  are  slowly,  and  with 
many  inconsistencies,  developing  themselves,  as  the 
results  of  a  contest  between  fresh  sentiment  and 
long  established  usage.  We  must  reproduce  this 
state  of  things,  with  some  little  energy  of  the  imagi- 
nation, in  order  to  look  upon  this  Epistle  from  the 
Apostle's  point  of  view.  All  is  disorder,  inconsis- 
tency, incompleteness.  The  new  influence  is  par- 
tially disengaging  some  elements,  and  combining 
imperfectly  with  others,  but  as  yet  has  produced  no 
crystallized  forms.  The  Christian  spirit,  introduced 
like  leaven  into  the  mass  of  heathen  and  Jewish 
ideas,  has  thrown  them  into  violent  fermentation, 
and  an  incongruous  union  of  the  old  and  the  new 
Life  is  for  a  time  the  genuine  and  the  right  result  of 
these  mixing  agencies.  Nothing  could  have  proved 
so  fatal  to  the  safe  establishment  of  Christianity,  as 
that,  in  such  a  crisis,  a  man  of  a  conventional  and 
narrow  spirit,  a  rigid  exacter  of  external  consistency 
and  symmetry,  had  taken  the  lead  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  Church,  and  made  it  his  first  object  to 
impress  the  Ideals  of  his  own  mind,  the  final  results 
of  Christian  principles,  on  the  natural  and  healthy 
disorder  of  the  times.     Here  was  the  spiritual  equal- 

10 


110  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

ity  of  all  mankind  —  the  doctrine  of  individual  re- 
sponsibility, and  of  course  of  an  unlimited  right 
over  our  own  limbs  and  souls,  that  we  may  obey 
our  own  conscience  —  proclaimed  in  the  midst  of  a 
civilization  of  which  Slavery  was  a  fundamental  in- 
stitution ;  —  a  doctrine  w^hich  could  not  instantly  be 
realized  without,  not  only  a  revolution  in  the  inward 
sentiment,  but  a  total  derangement  in  the  daily  life 
of  a  whole  people,  —  such  a  derangement  as,  if  im- 
mediately enforced,  must  have  reduced  Society  to  its 
first  elements,  and  led  to  a  direct  collision  of  conflict- 
ing interests.  Here,  the  pure  sentiment,  of  Christian 
Love,  and  a  sense  of  the  union  of  all  spirits  in  holy 
relation  to  one  Heavenly  Father,  was  penetrating 
the  bosom  of  Heathen  families,  and  separating  some 
wedded  heart  from  a  partner  who  still  revelled  in 
the  worship  and  the  license  of  Idolatry.  Here  were 
the  very  household  usages  of  a  People  determined 
by  the  daily  sacrifices  to  the  gods,  and  interwoven 
with  all  the  observances  of  Polytheism  ;  —  and  to 
stand  aloof  from  all  contact  with  Idolatry  would 
have  been  to  renounce  the  World.  Now  it  greatly 
increases  the  feeling  of  reality  with  which  we  con- 
ceive of  Christianity  coming  as  a  new  Influence  into 
the  world,  when  we  thus  historically  find  it  engaged 
in  collision  with  the  modes  of  common  Life  created 
by  a  spirit  so  different  from  its  own,  —  and  can 
trace  the  moral  inconsistencies,  the  first  incomplete 
workings,  of  the  partial  penetration  of  its  energy  in- 
to the  bosom  of  the  Heathen  and  Jewish  civiliza- 
tions. And  when  we  consider  that  the  Authenticity 
of  these  Epistles  of  St.  Paul  has  never  been  disputed 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  Ill 

by  any  party,  we  cannot  conceive  that  any  thing  more 
is  wanting  to  the  substantial  validity  of  the  external 
evidences  of  Christianity,  —  nor  how,  amid  such 
vivid  pictures  of  its  actual  workings,  the  reality  of 
that  new  Influence,  introduced  from  on  high  into  the 
affairs  of  men,  can  in  its  essential  character  be  open 
to  question,  or  received  by  so  many  earnest  minds 
with  vague  and  doubting  Faith.  The  delineation 
of  Christ's  mind  can  be  collected  only  from  the  Gos- 
pels ;  but  as  evidences  of  the  Reality  of  some  higher 
influence,  introduced  by  God  through  the  person  of 
Christ  into  the  common  heart  of  the  World,  the 
Epistles  afford  the  ground  on  which  the  Argument 
can  decisively  be  conducted. 

I.  And  if  the  actual  appearance  of  these  diffi- 
culties, in  the  midst  of  the  common  relations  of 
Heathen  and  Jewish  life,  is  the  best  proof  of  the 
reality  of  the  Christian  Influence,  the  spirit  in  which 
they  were  met  and  overcome  exalts  the  character  of 
that  Influence  to  the  calmness  and  comprehensive- 
ness of  God,  by  that  "  meekness  of  wisdom  "  which 
is  the  least  questionable  sign  of  whatever  is  Divine. 
Knoioledge^  superior  enlightenment,  the  Freedom  of 
a  strong  mind  from  religious  weaknesses,  St.  Paul 
maintains,  have  their  distinctive  and  Christian  value, 
not  in  enabling  a  man  to  pursue  his  own  way,  but 
in  enabling  him  to  tread,  with  a  quiet  and  sympa- 
thizing heart,  in  the  harmless  ways  which,  for  a 
time,  the  comparative  feebleness  of  others  may  com- 
pel them  to  adopt.  In  relation  to  things  indifferent, 
who  ought  to  yield,  —  the  strong  or  the  weak,  —  the 


112  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

scrupulous  or  the  enlightened?  —  those  who  deem 
them  essential  and  indispensable,  —  or  those  who 
deem  them  of  no  vital  importance  whatever,  the  one 
way,  or  the  other  ?  The  weak  cannot  yield,  without 
an  injury  and  violence  to  Conscience,  the  worst  of 
all  evils  ;  and  if  the  strong  will  not  yield,  because 
they  stand  on  the  individual  rights  of  their  own  En- 
lightenment, then  Christian  Unity  is  broken  by  those 
who  follow  the  guidance  of  Knowledge  alone,  and 
take  no  guidance  from  Love.  The  Christian  use  of 
a  spiritual  discernment  of  things  essential,  is  to  en- 
able a  large  mind  to  act  with  forbearance  in  things 
indifferent,  —  to  yield  to  the  scrupulous  who  con- 
scientiously cannot  yield,  —  and  in  its  tenderness 
and  comprehensiveness  to  manifest  the  catholic  and 
healing  spirit  of  true  Religion.  What  is  the  moral 
use  of  Strength,  if  it  does  not  enable  us  to  bear  with 
the  weaknesses  of  others  ?  The  strong,  unless  they 
can  vindicate  their  right  to  walk  the  world  alone, 
and  come  into  contact  with  no  mind  but  God's,  are 
the  last  who  can,  with  a  clear  conscience,  pass  by 
the  infirmities  of  the  feeble.  It  is  for  the  weak  to 
be  intolerant  of  the  weak,  —  for  his  own  helplessness 
is  enough  for  each,  and  their  mutual  infirmities  may 
come  into  selfish  collision;  but  it  is  for  the  strong, 
who  can  do  it,  to  forbear,  and  stoop,  and  lift  the 
burden,  in  thankfulness  of  heart  to  God,  by  whose 
grace  it  is  that  he  himself  is  not  one  of  those  who 
crowd,  and  straiten,  and  embarrass  the  way  of  Life. 
What  is  the  boasted  privilege  of  Liberty,  if  we  are 
as  much  Bigots  in  our  opposition  to  scruples  as 
others  are  in  their  slavery  to  them  ?     It  is  the  glory 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  113 

of  the  free  mind,  that  in  things  indifferent  it  can 
move  off  its  own  ground  of  abstract  Knowledge,  and 
with  a  clear  and  loving  heart  go,  and  join  itself,  to 
the  weak  and  the  bound,  who  cannot  come  to  it. 
This  is  the  Law  of  guidance  in  all  such  collisions, 
which  St.  Paul,  with  exquisite  beauty  and  force  of 
expression,  lays  down  for  those  Corinthian  leaders, 
who,  severing  Knowledge  from  Love,  deemed  them- 
selves strong  and  independent  in  their  religious  en- 
lightenment. Knowledge,  unless  placed  under  the 
guidance  of  Sympathy,  is  not  a  Christian  principle 
of  action,  in  relation  to  other  minds.  Knowledge 
alone  only  elateth  the  individual;  but  when  guided 
by  Love,  it  buildeth  up  the  Church.  "  Knowledge 
puffeth  up,  but  Charity  buildeth  up."  "  If  a  man 
thinketh  that  he  knoweth  any  thing,  and  that  his 
Knowledge  makes  for  him  an  independent  path  in 
his  moral  relations  to  others,  then  he  knoweth  noth- 
ing as  he  ought  to  know :  but  if  any  man  love  God, 
and  sinks  all  individual  pretensions  in  his  common 
relation  to  the  universal  Father,  and  so  rises  above 
self-love  into  a  disinterested  affection,  —  the  same 
is  known  of  God,  —  God  recognizes  in  him  His  own 
spirit."  Here  it  is  remarkable  that  the  man  who 
loves  God  is  not  said  to  know  God,  —  but  God  is  said 
to  know  him.  In  the  same  manner,  the  Son  of  Man 
is  represented  as  saying  to  those  who  do  not  man- 
ifest the  mercies  of  his  temper,  "  /  knoio  you  notP 
Such  expressions  show  how  thoroughly  the  spirit- 
ual sentiment  had  penetrated  to  the  finest  sources 
of  language ;  and  in  both  cases  they  mean,  that  the 
spirit  of  God,  full  of  Grace  as  of  Truth,  has  no  inti- 

10* 


114  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

mate  connections  with  self-centred,  unsympathizing 
natures,  —  dwells  not  in  such  breasts,    (viii.  1,  3.) 

II.  The  particular  case  which  required  the  clear 
expression  of  this  practical  Rule,  arose  out  of  the 
impossibility,  in  a  Heathen  City,  of  avoiding  contact 
with  the  daily  sacrifices  of  Polytheism.  The  Tem- 
ples were,  in  fact,  in  a  great  measure  the  Markets  of 
the  Heathen  world.  The  sacrifices  were  not  entirely 
consumed  on  the  altars,  and  what  remained  were 
the  perquisites  of  the  Priests,  or  the  property  of  the 
offerers.  A  feast  in  the  Temple  was  the  usual  se- 
quel to  a  sacrifice;  and  a  strong-minded  Christian, 
who  believed  that  an  Idol  was  nothing  in  the  world, 
and  that,  notwithstanding  the  Pagan  worship  of  gods 
many  and  lords  many,  there  was  but  one  God  our 
Father,  and  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  might  have  no 
scruple  in  partaking  of  the  feast,  which  could  not  be 
an  act  of  worship  to  the  Idol,  in  whose  very  exist- 
ence he  did  not  believe.  This  is  the  case  which, 
in  the  eighth  and  ninth  chapters,  St.  Paul  discusses 
with  those  who  took  their  abstract  Knowledge  and 
enlightenment  alone,  unguided  by  a  Christian  sym- 
pathy for  the  scruples  of  the  weaker  brethren,  as 
their  only  Law  of  social  action.  Admitting  that 
the  thing  was  in  itself  indifferent,  and  that  an  Idol 
was  nothing  in  the  world,  and  so  could  have  no 
worship  paid  to  it,  he  yet  condemns  a  participation 
of  the  Feast  in  the  Idol's  Temple,  as  a  wanton  dis- 
regard of  the  consciences  of  others,  and  a  dangerous 
snare  for  their  own.  The  Knoivledge,  alleged  in  ex- 
cuse, "  that  there  was  no  God  but  one,"  and  that 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  115 

"  God  taketh  no  account  of  meats,  for  neither  if 
we  eat  are  we  the  better,  nor  if  we  eat  not  are  we 
the  worse,"  —  was  indeed  a  self-justification,  if  they 
had  been  alone  in  the  Avorld,  with  God  only,  —  and 
their  conduct  had  reflected  no  influences  on  the  souls 
of  others.  But  no  man,  except  in  the  silent  depths 
of  the  spirit,  sustains  these  exclusive  relations  with 
the  Father  of  the  Soul,  —  no  man  liveth  to  himself 
even  in  things  pertaining  to  God,  and  a  wise  and 
tender  sympathy  for  the  interests  of  others  must 
qualify  and  guide  his  Knowledge,  —  else,  "  he  know- 
eth  nothing  as  he  ought  to  know."  Others  of 
weaker  Faith,  of  temperaments  more  sensitive  to  the 
consecrated  impressions  of  the  Past,  less  free  from 
the  lingering  vestiges  of  the  old  Idolatry,  might  not 
have  this  absolute  conviction  of  the  non-existence 
of  the  Idol  God,  and  eat  in  trembling  doubt,  or  with 
a  scrupulous  alarm  lest  the  very  act  of  eating  might 
imply  worship  and  recognition,  —  and  so  the  weak 
conscience  be  defiled.  "  Take  heed  lest  by  any 
means  this  your  Liberty  become  an  occasion  of  sin 
to  those  that  are  weak.  For  if  any  one  see  thee, 
who  hast  Knowledge,  sitting  at  meat  in  an  Idol's 
Temple,  will  not  his  conscience,  if  he  be  weak, 
be  encouraged  to  eat  things  offered  to  Idols?  and 
thus,  through  thy  Knowledge,  without  love  or  self- 
denial,  the  weak  brother,  for  whom  Christ  in  self- 
denial  died,  will  lapse  into  guilt.  And  when  ye 
thus  sin  against  the  brethren,  and  wound  their  weak 
conscience,  ye  sin  against  Christ.  Wherefore  if 
meat  make  my  brother  to  offend,  I  will  never  more 
eat  meat,  lest  I  make  my  brother  to  offend." 


116  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

III.  The  connection  of  the  ninth  chapter  with  this 
Christian  Duty,  of  consideration  for  the  wounded 
Conscience  of  the  weakest  Disciple,  is  not  distinctly- 
stated.  Yet  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  St.  Paul 
appealed  to  his  own  Example,  in  proof  that  he  made 
no  claim^on  their  forbearance  or  tenderness  that  he 
himself  was  not  willing  to  observe,  —  and  that  the 
superior  Knowledge,  and  spiritual  Liberty,  which 
had  never  exonerated  Jiim  from  tender  adaptation  to 
the  wants,  weaknesses,  and  susceptibilities  of  Jew  or 
Gentile,  could  not  be  pleaded  by  them  in  excuse  for 
the  sin  of  self-concentrated  disregard  for  the  moral 
Temptations  that  belonged  to  any  peculiar  expe- 
riences, or  forms  of  mind.  There  is  a  slight  obscurity, 
or  strangeness,  in  occasional  expressions,  arising,  it 
would  appear,  from  St.  Paul's  alluding,  in  an  indirect 
way,  to  the  injurious  representations  of  his  depre- 
ciating opponents  at  Corinth,  —  whilst  at  the  same 
time  he  is  pursuing  the  main  current  of  his  Christian 
argument.  It  is  only  on  this  supposition,  that  some 
unjust  suspicion  had  been  cast  on  the  genepsity  of 
his  motives,  or  some  doubt  hinted  of  the  authority 
of  his  Apostleship,  on  the  ground  that  he  had  had  no 
personal  intercourse  with  Christ,  —  that  we  can  ac- 
count for  the  necessity  he  seems  to  feel,  of  first  vin- 
dicating his  Character,  which  in  the  Second  Epistle 
we  shall  find  him  obliged  to  do  at  great  length,  — 
and  of  claiming  the  fulness  of  his  Office,  before  he 
proceeds  to  make  application  to  their  case  of  the  Ex- 
ample he  had  shown  of  the  voluntary  resignation  of 
his  own  Liberty,  for  the  sake  of  the  spiritual  welfare 
of  the  Church.    For  the  sake  of  unobstructed  access 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  117 

to  the  Jewish  mind,  he  had  resigned  his  Liberty  in 
ceremonial  observances,  in  meats,  and  drinks,  and 
fasts,  and  remained  under  the  Law,  —  though  no 
man  made  less  account  of  such  matters.  For  the 
sake  of  entire  devotion  to  his  missionary  service,  he 
had  resigned  all  personal  affections,  and  wedded  his 
spirit  only  to  the  Church  of  Christ.  For  the  sake  of 
the  loftier  influence  that  belongs  to  an  unrewarded 
service,  he  had  resigned  his  Right  of  maintenance,  — 
the  Right  of  living  by  his  work  that  belongs  to  every 
laborer,  even  to  the  ox  that  treadeth  out  the  corn, 
—  and  he  had  toiled  with  his  own  hands,  that  he 
might  burden  no  one,  and  the  Gospel  be  a  fred  gift. 
The  early  life  of  Saul  the  Persecutor,  the  enemy  of 
Christ,  left  one  indelible  impression  on  the  heart  of 
the  Apostle,  —  not  in  bitterness  or  remorse,  but  in 
the  inextinguishable  desire  to  do  free  service  for  the 
Gospel, — to  atone  for  the  Past  by  spending,  and 
being  spent,  in  its  cause,  without  being  placed  in  any 
connection  with  it  to  which  the  thought  of  a  recom- 
pense could  attach.  How  noble  is  this  desire  to  do 
something  voluntarily^  over  and  above  what  he  was 
bound  to  do,  on  the  part  of  one  who,  though  no  vic- 
tim of  morbid  memories,  could  not  altogether  efface 
from  his  heart  its  past  history.  "  Though  I  preach 
the  Gospel,  I  have  nothing  to  glory  of :  because  ne- 
cessity is  laid  upon  me ;  yea,  woe  is  unto  me  if  I 
preach  not  the  Gospel.  But  if  I  do  this  willingly^ 
I  have  a  reward.  What  then  is  my  reward?  Verily, 
that,  while  I  preach  the  Gospel,  I  make  the  ministry 
of  the  Gospel  to  be  without  recompense,  —  that  I 
serve  in  Love."     "And  though  free  from  all  men,  I 


118  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

have  made  myself  the  slave  of  all,  that,  by  meeting 
their  wants,  I  might  win  them  to  the  Gospel.  With 
the  Jews  I  had  intercom*se  as  a  Jew,  that  I  might 
gain  the  Jews :  to  those  without  the  Law,  I  became 
as  one  under  Law  to  God  and  Christ  only,  —  that  I 
might  gain  those  that  were  without  the  Jewish  Law ; 
to  the  weak  I  became  as  weak,  that  I  might  gain  the 
weak:  I  have  become  all  things  to  all  men,  that  I 
might  by  all  means  save  some.  And  this  have  I 
done  for  the  Gospel's  sake,  that  I,  too,  may  have  a 
share  in  its  diffusion." 

The  application  to  the  Corinthians,  and  to  all 
men,*lies  in  this,  —  that  the  Christian  service  is  one 
of  disinterested  regard  for  the  benefit  of  others,  and 
that  we  must  abjure  our  self-will  whenever  it  inter- 
feres with  this  end,  —  and,  instead  of  standing  on  our 
individuality,  forget  ourselves  in  sympathy.  This 
is  the  incorruptible  crown  for  which  the  Christian 
strives,  this  is  the  glory  of  Christ  himself,  —  to  find 
our  life  and  joy,  not  in  working  our  own  pleasure, 
or  seeking  our  own  ends,  but  in  blessing  others, 
when  and  how  they  can  be  blessed,  and  finding, 
without  seeking,  our  own  blessedness  therein.  And 
if  we  seek  this  glory  of  the  Lord,  we  must  first 
strive  for  mastery  over  ourselves,  and  keep  our  self- 
will  under,  and  have  our  affections  directed  not  on 
ourselves  but  out  of  ourselves,  fixed  on  those  whom 
by  our  true  service  we  may  bless,  else  we  "  run  with 
no  definite  object,  and  we  fight  as  one  that  beats  the 
air."  Those  who  would  be  Victors  in  this  contest, 
Athletes  in  this  fight,  must  carry  no  dead-weights 
of  selfishness,  —  must  find  their  element  in  the  spirit 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  '  119 

of  self-forgetfulness,  —  their  genuine  blessedness  in 
disinterested  affections,  —  in  the  exercise  of  a  pure 
Love,  whose  singleness  of  eye  has  no  view  to  recom- 
pense, no  self-directed  glance.  This  was  the  spirit, 
the  joy,  the  power,  the  crown,  of  him  who  reigneth 
from  the  Cross. 

God  give  us  grace  to  be  in  fellowship  with  that 
first-born  of  many  Brethren  ! 


120  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION    III. 

CAUTION  AGAINST  SELF-CONFIDENCE  ;     LEST  AN    UNSCRUPU- 
LOUS FAMILIARITY  WITH  POLYTHEISTIC  HABITS  MIGHT  LEAD 

TO  A  RELAPSE  INTO  HEATHENISM. THE  PARALLEL  CASE  OF 

THE  JEWS  OF  OLD. COMMUNION  WITH    CHRIST    EXCLUDES 

ALL  DALLIANCE  WITH  IDOLATRY. LOVE  SHOULD  CONTROL 

LIBERTY  IN  THINGS  INDIFFERENT. 


CHAPS.  X.  1-33 -XI.  1. 


X.  1.  For,  Brethren,  I  would  not  that  ye  should  be  ig- 
norant,   that    all   our   fathers    were    under    the    cloud, 

2  and   all  passed  through  the  sea ;  and  were  all  baptized 

3  into   Moses,  in  the  cloud  and   in    the   sea  ;   and  did  all 

4  eat  the  same  spiritual  bread,  and  did  all  drink  the 
same  spiritual  drink,  for  they  drank  from  that  spir- 
itual   rock   which    followed    them,   and    that    rock    was 

5  Christ;  —  yet  with  most  of  them  God  was  not  pleased, 

6  for  they  were  slain  in  the  desert.  Now  these  things 
have   become  examples   for  us,  that  we  should  not  lust 

7  after  evil  things,  even  as  they  lusted :  nor  become 
idolaters  as  some  of  them  did  ;  as  it  is  written,  "  The 
people   sat    down    to   eat   and    drink,    and    rose    up   to 

8  play."  *  Neither  let  us  commit  fornication,  as  some  of 
them   committed,  and  fell   in  one    day   three-and-twenty 

9  thousand.     Neither   let  us  try   Christ,   as  some  of  them 
10  also   tried,   and   were   destroyed    by   serpents.     Neither 

murmur,  as  some  of  them  also  murmured,  and  perished 

♦  Exod.  xxxii.  6. 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  121 

11  by  the  destroyer.  Now  all  these  things  happened  to 
them  as  examples,  and  are  written  for  our  admonition, 

12  upon  whom  the  ends  of  the  ages  are  come.  Where- 
fore let  him,   who   thinketh  he   standeth,  take  heed  lest 

13  he  fall.  There  hath  no  temptation  taken  you  but 
such  as  is  common  to  man  :  and  God  is  faithful,  who 
will  not  suffer  you  to  be  tempted  above  that  ye  are 
able,  but  will  with  the  temptation  make  also  a  way   of 

14  escape,   that  ye   may   be   able   to   endure.     Wherefore, 

15  my   beloved,    flee    from    idolatry.     I    speak   as   to   wise 

16  men  :  judge  ye  what  I  say.  The  cup  of  blessing  which 
we  bless,  is  it  not  the  communion  of  the  blood  of 
Christ?     The  bread  which  we  break,  is  it  not  the  com- 

17  munion  of  the  body  of  Christ  ?  That  as  there  is  one 
bread,  we,  being  many,  are  one  body,  for   we  all  par- 

18  take  of  the  one  bread.  Behold  Israel  according  to 
the  flesh :  are  not  they  which  eat  of  the  sacrifices    par- 

19  takers  of  the  altar  ?  What  then  do  I  say  ?  that  an  idol 
is   any   thing  ?    or  that   what   is    sacrificed    to   idols  is 

20  any  thing  ?  No,  but  that  what  the  Gentiles  sacrifice, 
they  sacrifice  to  demons  and  not  to  God;  and  I  would 
not   that   ye    should   become    in   communion    with   de- 

21  mons.  Ye  cannot  drink  the  cup  of  the  Lord,  and  the 
cup  of  demons  :  ye  cannot  partake    of  the  table  of  the 

22  Lord,  and  of  the  table  of  demons.  Do  we  provoke  the 
Lord  to  jealousy  ?     Are  we  stronger  than  he  ? 

23  All   things   are   lawful ;     but   all    are   not   exepdient. 

24  All  things  are   lawful ;    but  all    do    not   edify.     Let   no 

25  one  seek  his  own,  but  that  of  another.  All  that  is 
sold  in   the    market   eat,   asking   no   questions  for  con- 

26  science'    sake.     For   the  earth   is   the   Lord's,    and  the 

27  fulness  thereof.  And  if  any  of  the  unbelievers  invite 
you,  and  ye  be  willing  to  go,  whatever  is  set  before 
you   eat,    asking  no   questions     for    conscience'    sake. 

11 


122  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

28  But  if  any  one  say  to  you,  "  This  hath  been  sacri- 
ficed  to   idols,  "  eat    not,  because  of  him  that  pointed 

29  it  out,  and  because  of  conscience.  Conscience  I  say, 
not    thine   own,   but   that   of  the  other.      Why   is   my 

30  liberty  judged  of  by  another  man's  conscience  ?  If  I 
partake  by  grace,  why  am  I  evil  spoken  of,  on  account 

31  of  that  for  which  I  give  thanks  ?  Whether,  therefore, 
ye   eat   or   drink,   or  whatever  ye  do,   do  all  to  God's 

32  glory.     Become  occasions  of  sin  neither  to  Jews,  nor  to 

33  Gentiles,  nor  to  the  Church  of  God  :  even  as  I  please 
all  men  in  all  things,  not  seeking  mine  own  benefit 
but  the   benefit   of  the  many,  that  they  may  be  saved. 

XI.  1.   Become  imitators  of  me,  even  as  I  am  of  Christ. 


There  is  something  of  pleasing  and  graceful  sen- 
timent in  the  prevalent  conception,  that  the  Early 
Ages  of  the  Church  were  the  pure  times  of  Chris- 
tianity. The  mind  does  not  readily  adapt  itself  to 
the  idea,  that  Antiquity  was  the  Infancy  of  human 
wisdom  and  development,  —  and  that  modern  men 
are  the  Sages  of  Time.  There  is  an  instinctive  ten- 
dency to  regard  that  venerable  Past  as  the  Fountain- 
head  of  Knowledge,  and  to  place  ourselves  in  hum- 
ble attitude,  as  juniors  and  disciples,  at  the  feet  of 
those  "  gray  fathers  "  of  the  Ancient  World.  This 
indeed  is  but  a  sentiment,  which  reflection  speedily 
corrects  ;  and,  as  happens  to  most  sentiments,  even 
to  those  that  have  a  divine  Right  of  Rule,  it  is  not 
suffered  to  stand  in  the  way  of  any  practical  inter- 
est that  touches  the  business  and  bosoms  of  men. 
Reverence    for    Antiquity   will    impede    no    man's 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  123 

gains,  amd  the  Wisdom  of  our  Ancestors  is  seldom 
used  as  an  argument  against  change,  except  when 
it  is  a  profitable  plea.  There  are  minds,  no  doubt, 
abstracted  from  the  world,  with  whom  this  worship 
of  the  Past  is  a  lofty  and  enthusiastic  sentiment, 
nor  do  we  envy  the  man  whose  thoughts  are  never 
tinged  by  its  solemn  power.  But  still,  wherever 
in  the  press  of  real  life,  in  the  great  questions  that 
practically  affect  Society,  that  sentiment  holds  its 
place  as  a  guide  to  conduct,  it  will  be  found  on  the 
side  of  Interest  and  Ease,  —  that  under  its  influence 
large  classes  of  men  neither  make  sacrifices  for  the 
good  of  others,  nor  resist  advantages  for  themselves. 
It  has  indeed  too  slight  a  basis  of  truth  to  be  of  any 
practical  force,  except  when  allied  with  some  secret 
motive  of  self.  That  no  voice  comes  to  us  from  the 
first  Ages  of  the  world  for  thousands  of  years,  because, 
even  as  children  write  no  Histories,  undeveloped 
man  had  nothing  to  record ;  —  that  the  earliest  exer- 
cise of  human  faculties  was  in  the  helpless  surren- 
der of  the  Imagination,  a  dim,  passive,  and  shadowy 
JNIirror,  to  the  forms  of  the  Outward  World  ;  —  that 
the  first  Worship  and  the  first  Civilization  were  in 
rude  attempts  to  symbolize  the  Powers  of  Nature  in 
vast  and  shapeless  emblems  ;  — that  the  period  of  au- 
thentic History  commenced  only  when  Man  ceased 
to  lie,  like  a  dreaming  child,  on  the  mighty  bosom  of 
the  External  Universe,  and  awoke  dimly  to  the  con- 
sciousness of  an  inward  Life  and  a  spiritual  Nature, 
designed  to  interpret  and  rule  the  Outward,  not 
to  lie  prostrate  beneath  it ;  —  that  Experience  is  ac- 
cumulative and  her  lessons  most  abundant,  not  in 


124  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

the  earlier  but  in  the  latter  Ages  ;  —  that  all  physical 
science  is  of  modern  date,  and  only  in  the  sixteenth 
century  an  Englishman  revealed  the  methods  by 
which  Nature  should  be  studied ;  —  that  Eevelation 
itself  has  had  an  historical  development,  and  Moses 
and  the  Prophets  are  no  longer  the  Lights  of  spir- 
itual man :  —  these  are  facts,  in  the  face  of  which 
mere  veneration  for  Antiquity  cannot  reasonably  be 
expected  to  hold  its  place,  against  any  real  interest, 
or  temptation,  of  the  world. 

But  no  sooner  is  one  Figure  of  the  Imagination 
removed  than  another  takes  its  place ;  for  it  is 
wonderful  to  what  extent  Metaphors  rule  the  world. 
If  length  of  experience  belongs  to  modern  men,  and 
we,  in  the  opportunities  of  knowledge,  are  the  sen- 
iors of  Antiquity,  —  then  we  change  the  emblem, 
and,  since  we  cannot  regard  the  olden  Time  as  the 
hoary  Age,  we  now  call  it  the  Infancy  of  the  Race  ; 
and  no  sooner  have  we  given  it  that  name,  than 
images  of  purity,  and  simplicity,  and  innocence,  rise 
before  us, —  the  golden  light  of  Childhood  fills  our 
eye ;  —  and  the  next  error  we  fall  into  is,  that,  if  the 
Primitive  Times  were  not  wiser,  they  were  at  least 
purer,  gentler,  with  the  first  freshness  of  heavenly 
affections  yet  unsullied  and  unworn.  Alas !  we  for- 
get that  this  Infancy  of  the  Race  is  all  a  figure ;  that 
the  ignorance  of  a  child  was  united  to  the  passions 
of  a  man,  —  the  most  dreadful  combination  of  moral 
elements  that  Humanity  can  present.  The  animal 
nature  in  its  fiercest  vigor,  the  moral  and  intellect- 
ual nature  helpless  as  infancy,  —  are  these,  mate- 
rials to  produce  a  Golden  Age  ?  —  or  do  they  now, 


I.    COR.   CHAPS.   X.,  XI.  125 

in  the  untaught  masses,  who  have  developed  pas- 
sions and  undeveloped  souls,  produce  the  fabled 
tenderness  and  simplicity  of  the  world's  youth  ? 
That  the  former  Times  were  better  than  the  Present, 
is  what  no  one  with  the  least  acquaintance  with 
Antiquity  will  be  forward  to  maintain,  —  and  in  fact 
only  the  total  absence  of  any  enlightened  public 
sentiment,  the  silence  and  unconcern  that  suffered 
familiar  inhumanities  to  pass  almost  unoticed, 
without  a  recording  word  or  a  resisting  struggle, 
have  left  out  the  dark  coloring  of  truth.  The  very 
protests  of  this  Age  against  the  ills  that  afflict  it, 
contribute  to  swell  our  impressions  that  we  have 
fallen  upon  evil  times.  That  of  which  we  hear  so 
much,  we  imagine  to  be  growing  in  amount.  The 
constant  denunciations  of  public  injustice,  and  of 
private  vice,  never  permit  us  to  lose  the  feeling 
that  we  dwell  in  a  bad  world.  There  were  Times, 
and  not  distant  ones,  when  the  evils  were  greater, 
and  the  denunciations  less,  because  there  was  no 
enlightened  Opinion  to  appeal  to,  and  no  public 
Virtue  to  speak  out.  I  am  not  the  apologist  of  the 
present  Times,  yet,  however  we  may  fail  to  detect 
the  exact  law  by  which  Providence  regulates  the 
progress  of  Man,  a  successive  progress  History 
broadly  declares,  and  though  we  are  justly  dissatis- 
fied with  our  present  condition,  yet  God  has  not 
deserted  us,  for  in  vain  shall  we  search  the  past 
for  a  nobler  Age. 

Of  all  the  delusions  which  have  grown  up  as  to 
the  wisdom  and  virtue  of  primitive  Times,  that  which 
affirms  the  perfection  and  purity  of  primitive  Chris- 
11* 


126  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tianity  is  the  most  blind,  both  to  the  facts  and  to 
the  reason  of  the  case.  "  The  light  shineth  in  dark- 
ness, and  the  darkness  comprehendeth  it  not,"  is  a 
truer  picture,  and  from  a  higher  authority.  Is  it 
reasonable  to  expect  that  the  Period  of  its  conflict 
with  Heathenism  should  bear  the  choicest  fruits  of 
its  unadulterated  spirit,  —  or  that  those  from  whose 
hearts  it  was  expelling  the  gross  darkness  of  the 
Pagan  worship,  should  reach  its  most  spiritual 
truths,  and  walk  in  its  divinest  light?  Does  it  be- 
long to  the  moral  nature  of  man  to  be  the  subject 
of  such  rapid  and  perfect  transformations,  —  to  empty 
the  mind  completely  of  one  set  of  influences,  and 
receive  at  once  the  entireness  and  purity  of  another, 
—  and,  without  a  long  term  of  intermediate  mixture 
and  struggle,  put  off"  the  Heathen  or  the  Jew,  and 
exhibit,  like  a  new  creation,  the  truest  symmetry  of 
Christian  development?  And  what  are  the  facts? 
Do  the  Gospels,  or  do  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul,  exhib- 
it a  more  spiritual  Discipleship,  as  we  approach  the 
person  of  Christ ;  or  present  a  Model  in  the  Churches 
that  had  an  Apostle  for  their  guide  ?  Christ's  life 
was  passed  without  the  conversion  of  a  single  soul; 
and  when  he  died,  the  Jewish  peculiarity  had  yielded 
to  the  Christian  Idea  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  in 
not  one  single  mind.  In  fact,  the  work  of  conver- 
sion, even  in  the  Apostles  themselves,  took  place  af- 
ter the  death  of  Christ ;  and  only  when  no  longer 
Jewish  notions  could  be  made  to  cohere  with  a  Mes- 
siah in  the  skies,  did  they  gradually,  and  by  neces- 
sity, adapt  their  conceptions  of  his  Mission  to  his 
now  spiritual  and  heavenly  state.     The  Resurrection 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  127 

and  Ascension  of  Messiah  are  usually  represented 
as  having  their  sole  objects  in  the  evidence  they  af- 
ford of  human  Immortality  ;  —  but  in  the  actual  His- 
tory of  Christianity,  the  first  purpose  they  served  was 
to  spiritualize  the  views  of  the  Apostles ;  —  for  with 
one  who  dwelt  no  longer  on  the  Earth,  all  his  rela- 
tions to  his  Church  must  be  of  an  inward,  heavenly, 
and  immortal  nature,  —  and  all  Jewish  apprehen- 
sions were  disengaged  from  his  person  as  he  ascend- 
ed to  God,  above  all  temporal  connections.  Still, 
however,  did  Judaism  endeavor  to  fasten  itself  on  as 
a  necessary  adjunct,  even  to  spiritual  Christianity ; 
and  those  who  had  come  nearest  to  the  fountain- 
head  of  Truth,  the  personal  companions  and  disci- 
ples of  our  Lord,  were  not  the  first  to  emancipate 
themselves  from  exclusive  and  unchristian  views. 
Stephen  the  Martyr,  in  mind  and  character  the  evi- 
dent prototype  of  Paul,  had  the  first  glimpse  of  the 
catholic  nature  of  the  Church  of  Christ;  and  St. 
Paul,  who  alone  in  the  Apostolic  Age  conceived 
aright  of  the  Universality  of  the  Gospel,  not  in 
peace  and  triumph,  but  against  controversy  and  re- 
sistance, proclaimed  the  essence  of  Christianity  — 
that  which  rises  above  outward  differences,  and 
unites  souls  by  an  inward  tie  —  to  be,  not  a  Right- 
eousness with  which  any  thing  external  can  inter- 
fere, but  "  the  Righteousness  of  God,  proceeding  out 
of  Faith." 

Or,  are  we  to  look  in  the  Churches  founded  and 
taught  by  St.  Paul  for  the  purity  and  perfection  of 
the  primitive  Christianity,  —  for  examples  of  evan- 
gelical Unity,  and  humble  submission  to  Apostolical 


128  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Authority?  The  Epistle  to  the  Romans  exhibits 
the  Jewish  and  the  Gentile  form  of  mind  looking 
upon  Christianity  from  different  positions ;  and  the 
two  partial  views  in  bitter  animosity  threatening  de- 
struction to  each  other.  The  Epistles  to  the  Corin- 
thians exhibit  schisms  in  Doctrine,  immoralities  in 
Practice,  Factions  organized  under  Leaders,  a  peril- 
ous observance  of  Idolatrous  usages,  proving  a  very 
imperfect  emancipation  from  the  Polytheistic  senti- 
ment, —  and  the  most  open  contempt  of  the  Author- 
ity of  the  Apostle.  The  Apostolic  Age  exhibits  no 
Church  Models,  —  no  uniformity  of  Faith  and  Sen- 
timent, —  no  gentle  reign  of  Truth  and  Love,  with 
quiet  submission  to  legitimate  Instructors,  —  no  per- 
fect realization  of  Christian  Communion  to  serve  as 
an  example  and  a  standard  for  successive  ages,  and 
by  the  claim  of  its  Beauty  and  Repose  to  awe  and  si- 
lence the  disturbing  outbreak  of  individual  Thought. 
These  are  not  the  Pictures  which  Christian  Antiq- 
uity presents  in  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul ;  nor  will 
peace  ever  be  restored  to  the  Church  by  the  endeav- 
or to  go  back  to  a  primitive  Uniformity,  that  never 
existed.  But  the  real  Picture  which  that  Age  pre- 
sents is  full  of  the  lessons  of  a  true  Peace  for  our 
present  times;  —  it  represents  an  attempt  by  Paul 
to  combine  a  unity  of  Spirit  with  the  utmost  diver- 
sity of  Forms,  Sonship  to  God  and  Brotherhood  to 
Christ  with  the  freest  varieties  of  national  and  in- 
tellectual differences,  —  and  it  exhibits  an  Apostle 
claiming  no  authority  to  settle  controversies,  to  re- 
duce to  one  common  formula  modes  of  worship,  or 
inequalities  of  speculative  view,  but  leaving  every 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  129 

man  free  to  be  what  he  pleased,  provided  only  he 
preserved  uninjured  the  sentiment  of  Christian  Love, 
and  found  his  Rule  of  conduct,  not  in  an  intensely- 
concentrated  regard  for  his  own  Rights,  but  in  the 
sympathy  of  the  Christian  spirit.  The  practical  di- 
rection of  the  Apostle  to  the  conflicting  elements  of 
the  primitive  Church  was,  to  yield  every  thing  ex- 
ternal for  the  sake  of  a  common  sentiment  of  fel- 
lowship with  Christ.  The  rule  of  "  the  Successors 
of  the  Apostles "  is,  to  make  every  thing  yield  to 
the  external  Uniformity,  and  to  let  the  unity  of  the 
Spirit  and  of  Love  pass  for  nothing,  without  the  out- 
ward symbols  of  agreement.  These  are  the  great 
lessons  we  collect  from  a  study  of  these  Epistles:  — 
that  there  never  was  a  perfect  realization  of  a  Chris- 
tian Church,  —  that  only  a  Uniformity  of  the  Chris- 
tian Temper  can  gradually  produce  that  Realiza- 
tion ;  —  and  that,  meanwhile,  he  is  working  against 
Christ  who  adopts  any  other  aim,  than  a  desire  for 
this  inward  unity  of  spirit  and  moral  purpose,  as  a 
Christian  Rule  of  conduct. 

We  saw,  in  the  last  two  chapters,  how  St.  Paul 
would  not  permit  those  Corinthians,  who  argued  a 
question  of  Practice  on  the  abstract  ground  of  their 
individual  knowledge  and  enlightenment,  to  avail 
themselves  of  that  plea;  that  not  even  on  a  subject 
so  little  doubtful  to  a  Christian  as  that  of  Idolatry, 
was  Knoivledge  alone  a  safe  guide  ;  nor  should  Chris- 
tian love  forget  the  traces  of  Polytheism  that  might 
linger  involuntarily  with  the  weakest  brother;  and 
in  his  recurrence  to  the  subject  of  this  tenth  chap- 
ter, he  evidently  fears,  that  those  who  violated  Love 


130 


FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


were  in  imminent  danger  of  violating  Knowledge 
too,  —  and  that  a  slight  and  vaunting  estimate  of  a 
temptation  overcome,  gave  no  security  that  they  were 
never  again  to  fall  beneath  its  power.  Here  then  we 
have  in  a  primitive  Church,  with  an  Apostle  at  its 
head,  —  what  indeed  we  might  reasonably  have  ex- 
pected,—  the  distinctly  announced  danger,  that,  over 
the  Christians  of  a  heathen  city.  Polytheism  might 
yet  regain  its  sway.  It  is  difficult  to  realize  how 
thoroughly  Polytheism  was  incorporated  with  the 
life  of  the  Ancients.  Every  familiar  salutation  in- 
voked the  gods ;  the  commonest  utensils  for  house- 
hold use  were  wrought  in  symbolic  shapes ;  all  the 
forms  and  courtesies  of  social  life  were  associated 
with  acts  of  worship ;  and  even  the  daily  meal  had 
first  been  offered  in  sacrifice. 

St.  Paul,  in  guarding  the  Corinthians  against  this 
atmosphere  of  insensible  temptation,  compares,  in 
this  respect,  the  primitive  Christian  with  the  prim- 
itive Jewish  Church  ;  and  warns  the  former  that  the 
lapse  into  Idolatry  made  by  the  Jews,  when  under 
the  most  signal  guidance  of  God,  was  an  example 
of  what  might  happen  again  to  a  people  who,  if  un- 
der the  same  guidance,  were  also  under  the  same 
temptations.  The  opportunities  which  the  Heathen 
Worship  supplied  for  the  gratification  of  the  sensual 
and  licentious  passions,  were  in  both  cases  the  mov- 
ing temptations  to  Idolatry;  and  in  a  city  prover- 
bially so  corrupt  as  Corinth,  the  Baal  Peor  of  old 
might  be  too  closely  paralleled  by  the  Aphrodite 
of  the  Greek.  Their  external  protections  were  the 
same,  —  and  the  inward  vices  that  had  seduced  the 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  181 

Jew  to  false  Worship  were  also  those  that  most 
abounded  in  the  Corinthian  character.  If,  argues 
St.  Paul,  some  of  the  Corinthians  have  been  sep- 
arated by  God  from  the  practices  of  the  Heathen 
World,  —  so   also   had  the  whole  body  of  the  Jews  : 

—  if  the  Corinthians  had  been  baptized  into  Christ, 

—  the  Jews  had  been  baptized  into  Moses,  and  had 
passed,  under  his  standard,  through  that  separating 
sea  which  left  behind  them,  as  a  memory,  their  for- 
mer and  idolatrous  Life:  —  if  the  Corinthians  had 
perpetual  remembrancers  of  that  spiritual  connection 
with  Christ,  in  their  participation  of  those  memorial 
emblems  which  signified  that  they  were  of  one  Body 
with  the  Lord,  —  so  also  the  Jew  ate  of  that  Manna 
in  the  Wilderness  which,  provided  without  toil  or 
care,  was  as  Bread  from  Heaven,  and  drank  from 
that  Rock  whose  gushing  streams  tracked  their  steps 
through  the  arid  Desert,  —  an  emblem  of  that  Foun- 
tain of  Living  Waters,  of  which  he  who  drinketh 
shall  never  thirst  again :  —  yet  these,  though  thus 
encompassed  about  with  a  divine  Hand,  fell  away 
from  God  through  the  very  lusts,  and  sins,  and  mur- 
murings,  that  were  rife  in  the  Corinthian  Church,  — 
and,  as  the  Examples  of  all  former  Times  are  for  the 
guidance  and  admonition  of  those  upon  whom  the 
latter  ages  have  come,  "  let  him  that  thinketh  he 
standeth,  take  heed  lest  he  fall."  There  hath  no 
Temptation  taken  any  one  but  such  as  is  common 
to  Man.  Temptation  is  universal ;  it  has  its  sources 
in  human  relations,  and  for  him  who  is  willing  to  be 
taught,  there  is  no  condition  so  peculiar,  but  in  the 
past  History  of  Man  there  is  the  failure  to  warn, 


132  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

and  the  example  to  guide ;  —  and  if  he  will  not 
make  temptations  for  himself,  if  he  will  not  impair 
his  own  spiritual  strength  by  contact  and  dalliance 
with  Evil,  God,  who  is  ever  faithful  to  the  earnest 
mind,  will  not  suffer  him  to  be  tempted  beyond  what 
he  is  able,  but  will  with  the  temptation,  to  those  that 
enter  into  no  voluntary  alliance  with  it,  make  a  way 
to  escape,  that  they  may  be  able  to  bear  it.  Where- 
fore, says  St.  Paul,  shaping  this  general  principle  to 
the  special  case,  give  no  facility  to  the  temptation, 
nor  indulge  in  the  careless  pride  of  strength,  but 
^'-  flee  from  Idolatry P 

We  are  prone  to  imagine  that  our  Temptations 
are  peculiar ;  —  that  other  hearts  are  free  from  secret 
burdens  that  oppress  our  energies,  and  cast  a  cloud 
upon  our  joy ;  that  Life  has  for  others  a  freer  move- 
ment, and  a  less  embarrassed  way.  But  in  no  one 
has  God  made  the  human  heart  to  carol  its  thought- 
less song  of  joy  ;  and  the  shadow  of  our  moral  being 
rests  darkly  on  us  all.  We  cannot  take  the  world 
as  it  comes,  enjoying  what  it  offers,  and  passing  by 
its  sufferings  and  its  burdens  with  our  lightest  touch  ; 
—  we  get  involved  in  the  deep  questions  of  Con- 
science and  Duty,  and  the  sense  of  Responsibility 
stills  the  carol  of  the  spirit,  and  suffers  no  man  to 
repose  without  a  trouble  on  the  bosom  of  life.  In- 
finite are  the  ways  in  which  the  devices  and  aims 
of  the  Moral  Nature  break  the  instinctive  happiness 
that  lives  for  the  day,  and  forgets  the  morrow ;  but 
effectually  this  awakening  of  deeper  and  sadder  life 
takes  place  in  all ;  and  struggle,  fear,  disappoint- 
ment, the  partial  feeling  of  an  unfilled  Destiny,  the 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  133 

restless  wavings  of  uncertain  Hopes,  are  in  the  heart 
of  every  man  who  has  risen  but  a  step  above  the  an- 
imal life.  The  more  we  know  of  what  passes  in 
the  minds  of  others,  the  more  our  friends  disclose 
to  us  their  secret  consciousness,  the  more  do  we 
earn  that  no  man  is  peculiar  in  his  moral  experi- 
ence, —  that  beneath  the  smoothest  surface  of  out- 
ward life  lie  deep  cares  of  the  heart,  —  and  that,  if 
we  fall  under  our  burdens,  we  fall  beneath  the  temp- 
tations that  are  common  to  Man,  the  existence  of 
which  others  as  little  suspect  in  us,  as  we  do  in 
them.  We  have  but  the  trials  that  are  incident  to 
humanity  ;  —  there  is  nothing  peculiar  in  our  case, 
—  and  we  must  take  up  our  burdens  in  faith  of 
heart  that,  if  we  are  earnest,  and  trifle  not  with 
temptation,  God  will  support  us,  as,  in  the  past 
fidelity  of  his  Providence,  he  has  supported  others 
as  heavily  laden  as  ourselves. 

St.  Paul  always  places  a  practical  question,  how- 
ever slight  and  passing,  in  the  light  of  the  largest 
and  most  permanent  Principles,  —  and  discusses  the 
smallest  outward  matter  in  connection  with  the 
most  spiritual  views  of  Life.  The  propriety  of  a 
Christian,  supposed  to  be  an  enlightened  Monothe- 
ist,  partaking  of  a  feast  in  an  Idol's  Temple,  which 
was  to  him  no  more  than  any  other  feast,  introduces 
three  leading  principles  of  the  Christian  Life:  —  1st. 
That  mere  knoivledg-Cy  without  a  consideration  for 
the  influences  we  may  exert  on  others,  is  not  a 
Christian  Rule  of  conduct ;  —  2dly.  The  Moral  Law 
in  relation  to  Temptation,  that  no  man,  whatever 
he  may  think  of  his  own  security,  is  safe,  or   in 

12 


134  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

God's  keeping,  who  gives  the  Tempter  opportu- 
nity ;  —  and  3dly.  The  Principle  that  is  contained 
in  the  passage  from  the  16th  to  the  22d  verse,  —  that 
acts,  the  most  indifferent  in  themselves,  may  yet  be 
so  eccentric  to  us,  so  unsuitable  to  our  position,  as 
to  violate  the  harmony  of  our  outward  life,  and  even 
to  peril  the  inward  consistency  of  the  character.  "  Is 
it  consistent,  is  it  sacred,"  such  is  the  argument  of 
this  passage,  "  that  you,  who,  by  solemnly  partaking 
of  the  emblems  of  the  broken  body  and  shed  blood 
of  Christ,  bring  before  your  religious  affections  your 
moral  union  with  the  Lord,  — that  his  Church  is  as 
his  Body,  and  draws  spirit  and  life  from  him  w^ho 
is  its  Head,  —  that  you  should,  in  the  wanton  exer- 
cise of  Liberty,  be  participant  in  a  Feast,  that  others 
regard  as  implying  the  same  spiritual  communion 
with  Idol  Deities  ?  You  cannot  be  inwardly  united 
to  both  ;  —  why  use  the  outward  form,  and  tempt 
God  by  reservations  ?  " 

But  the  Sacrifice  furnished  the  private  meal  as 
well  as  the  Temple  feast,  —  and  a  scrupulous  Con- 
science might  be  oppressed  with  daily  fears  lest  un- 
consciously it  was  touching  things  unclean,  or,  by 
eating  things  that  had  been  sacrificed  to  Idols,  dis- 
honoring God.  No  man  had  ever  less  sympathy 
with  a  straitened,  or  false,  Conscience ;  and  he  places 
no  restriction  on  the  utmost  Liberty,  except  that 
which  springs  from  another  Principle  altogether,  and 
has  no  connection  with  straitened  notions.  "  Let 
no  man  seek  his  own,  but  every  man  another s  weal." 
"  Whatever  is  sold  in  the  Market,  that  eat,  having 
no  scruples  of  conscience,  "  —  "  for  the  Earth  is  the 


I.    COR.   CHAPS.    X.,   XI.  135 

Lord's,  and  the  fulness  thereof";  —  every  thing  is 
His,  to  be  used  and  consecrated  by  a  grateful  heart. 
"  If  any  unbeliever  invite  you  to  his  house,  eat  wha-t 
is  set  before  you,  asking  no  questions  from  scruples 
of  conscience ;  but  if  a  weak  brother  say  unto  you, 
'  This  hath  been  offered  unto  Idols, '  then  eat  not  of 
it,  —  not  on  your  own  account,  but  lest  you  should 
tempt  the  weak  to  sin  against  his  Conscience."  The 
next  words,  forming  the  last  clause  of  the  29th 
verse,  if  they  are  ascribed  to  St.  Paul  as  the  expres- 
sion of  his  own  feelings,  are,  as  they  stand  in  our 
version,  in  violation  of  the  Apostle's  sentiments  :  — 
"  For  why  is  my  liberty  judged,  of  another  man's 
conscience  ;  and  if  I  by  grace  be  a  partaker,  why  am 
I  evil  spoken  of,  for  that  for  which  I  give  thanks  ?  " 
This  may  be  an  objection  which  St.  Paul  supposes 
to  be  made  by  the  Corinthian,  to  which  the  follow- 
ing verses  would  then  form  a  pertinent  answer:  — 
''  You  must  use  your  liberty,  not  for  your  own  grat- 
ification, but  for  the  good  of  others,"  —  Liberty  is 
not  a  principle  of  action.  Love  is  ;  —  "  Whether  ye 
eat,  or  drink,  or  whatsoever  ye- do,  let  the  desire  to 
do  all  to  the  glory  of  God  protect  you  from  injuring 
or  obstructing  another's  Faith.  Make  no  tempta- 
tion for  Jew,  nor  Gentile,  nor  for  the  Church  of 
God :  even  as  I  serve  all  men  in  all  things ;  not 
seeking  my  own  profit,  but  the  profit  of  the  many, 
that  they  may  be  saved.  In  this  be  ye  imitators  of 
me,  even  as  I  also  am  of  Christ."  The  passage,  if 
the  sentiment  of  it  is  attributed  to  St.  Paul,  must 
be  understood  thus :  —  "  For  why  should  I  act  so  as 
that  my  freedom  should  fall  under  the  condemna- 


136  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tion  of  another  man's  Conscience,  —  should  appear 
sinful  or  ill-used  freedom  through  the  offence  that  I 
give  ?  —  and  when  I  partake  of  meat  with  thanks- 
giving to  God,  why  do  I  act  so  as  to  injure  a  weak 
brother  by  means  of  that  for  which  I  give  thanks  ?  " 
That  is,  — "  Is  not  this  a  contradiction  ?  On  the 
one  hand,  I  thank  God  for  my  Liberty,  and  for  the 
good  things  which  He  has  bestowed,  —  and  on  the 
other  I  offend  against  Him,  and  make  a  mockery 
of  my  thanks,  by«  my  unchristian  disregard  for  the 
infirmity  of  my  Brother.  " 

Either  of  these  methods  is  admissible,  preserving 
to  St.  Paul  that  guiding  sentiment  of  Love  as  op- 
posed to  the  individual  pretensions  of  Knowledge, 
through  which  he  sought  to  realize  the  sublimest 
Idea  of  Christianity,  the  universal  Reign  of  Christ's 
spirit  upon  earth ;  in  every  heart  kindling  the  same 
solemn  ideas,  and  opening  the  same  living  springs  ; 
subduing  the  differences  of  class  and  country  by  the 
affinities  of  Worship,  by  kindred  images  of  Hope, 
of  Duty,  and  of  God. 

Such  was  the  Christian  vision  of  the  Church 
Universal,  —  of  the  union  of  all  good  men  in  the 
Love  of  one  God,  under  the  Leadership  of  his 
Image  in  Humanity,  —  growing  up  into  him,  in  all 
things,  which  is  the  Head,  even  Christ. 

It  is  profitless  to  ask,  —  What  has  obstructed  the 
Realization  ?  —  St.  Paul  at  least  is  free.  Let  his 
spirit  speak  to  us  in  one  of  his  own  Benedictions  :  — 
"  Grace  be  with  all  them  that  love  the  Lord  Jesus 
in  sincerity  !  "  * 

*  Ephes.  vi.  24. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  137 


SECTION    IV. 

IRREGULARITIES  FROM  SOME  ABUSE  BY  WOMAN  OF  HER 
SPIRITUAL  EQUALITY,  AND  FROM  A  PROFANE  AND  HEA- 
THENISH   ABUSE    OF    THE    LORD's    SUPPER. 


CHAP.  XI.  2-34. 

2  Now  I  praise  you,  brethren,  that  ye  remember  me 
in  all  things,  and  keep  the  instructions  as  I   delivered 

3  them  to  you.  But  I  wish  you  to  know  that  the  Head 
of  every  man  is  Christ ;  and  the  Head  of  woman,  man  ; 

4  and  the  Head  of  Christ,  God.  Every  man  that  pray- 
eth   or    prophesieth,    having   a  covering   on    his   head, 

5  dishonoreth  his  Head.  And  every  woman  praying 
or  prophesying  with  uncovered  head,  dishonoreth  her 
Head  :  for  it  is  one  and  the  same  thing  as  if  she  were 

6  shaven.  For  if  a  woman  is  uncovered,  let  her  also 
be    shorn,   but    if  it    is    a    disgrace  to  a  woman    to  be 

7  shorn  or  shaven,  let  her  be  covered.  For  man  indeed 
ought   not  to    cover  the    head,    being    the    image   and 

8  glory  of   God  :  but  woman  is  the    glory  of  man.     For 

9  man  is  not  of  woman,  but  the  woman  of  man.  Neither 
was    man    created    for   woman,    but   woman    for  man. 

10  Therefore  ought  the   woman  to    wear  his  authority   on 

11  her  head,  because  of  the  angels.  Yet  neither  is 
woman    separate    from    man,    nor    man   separate    from 

12  woman,    in   the    Lord.     For    as   woman  is    of  man,  so 

13  also  is   man  by   woman;   and    all    of  God.      Judge   of 

12* 


138  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

yourselves,   is    it    becoming   for    a   woman  to   pray  to 

14  God,  uncovered  ?  Does  not  nature  herself  teach  us, 
that  it  is  a   dishonor  to  a  man  if  he   have  long   hair  ? 

15  But  that   if  woman  have    long  hair,    it   is   a  glory  to 

16  her  ?  For  hair  is  given  to  her  for  a  covering.  But  if 
any  one  thinks  fit  to  be  contentious,  we  have  no  such 
custom  ;  neither  have  the  churches  of  God. 

17  But  I  praise  you  not,  in  declaring  this, —  that  not 
for   the   better,    but   for  the  worse,   ye   meet   together. 

18  For  first,  when  ye  meet  together  in  the  church,  I  hear 
that  there  are  schisms  among   you,  and   in   part   I    be- 

19  lieve  it.  For  there  must  indeed  be  separations  among 
you,  in   order  that  those  of  you  who  are  sterling  may 

20  be   manifest.      When   ye   meet  together   in   one  place, 

21  it  is  not  to  eat  the  Lord's  Supper.  For  each  taketh 
before  the   other   his   own  supper,   in  eating ;   and  one 

22  is  hungry,  and  another  is  drunken.  Have  ye  not 
houses  for  eating  and  drinking  ?  Or  do  ye  despise 
the    church   of  God,   and  shame  those   that  have   not.? 

23  What  shall  I  say  to  you  ?  Shall  I  praise  you  ?  In  this 
I  praise  you  not.  For  I  received  from  the  Lord,  that 
which  I  also  delivered  unto  you.  That  the  Lord  Jesus, 
on  the   night   in  which   he   was   betrayed,   took  bread. 

24  And  when  he  had  given  thanks,  he  brake  it,  and  said. 
This  is   my  body,   which   is   broken    for  you  :   this   do 

25  in  remembrance  of  me.  After  the  same  manner  also 
he  took  the  cup,  when  he  had  supped,  saying.  This 
cup  is  the  new  covenant  in  my  blood:    do  this,  as  oft 

26  as  ye  drink  it,  in  remembrance  of  me.  For  as  often  as 
ye   eat  this  bread,  and  drink  this  cup,  ye  do  show  the 

27  Lord's  death  till  he  come.  Wherefore,  whosoever  shall 
eat  the  bread,  or  drink  the  cup,  of  the  Lord,  unworthi- 
ly, shall  be   chargeable   with  the  body   and    the    blood 

28  of  the  Lord.     Let  a  man  try  himself,   and  so  let  him 


I.  COR.  CHAP.    XI.  139 

29  eat  of  this  bread,  and  drink  of  this  cup.  For  he  that 
eateth  and  drinketh  unworthily,  eateth  and  drinketh 
judgment   to   himself,  not   discerning   the   Lord's   body. 

30  On  this  account  many  among  you  are  weak  and  sickly, 

31  ^nd  some  sleep.     For  if  we  would  examine   ourselves, 

32  we  should  not  be  condemned  ;  but  when  we  are  con- 
demned by    the  Lord,  we  are  chastened,  that  we   may 

33  not  be  condemned  with  the  world.  Wherefore,  my 
brethren,   when   ye    come   together   to   eat,  receive   ye 

34  one  another.  And  if  any  one  is  hungry,  let  him  eat  at 
home,  that  ye  may  not  come  together  unto  condemnation. 
But  the  rest,  I  will  set  in  order,  when  I  come. 


Where  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  is,  there  is  Liberty  : 
for  Liberty  comes  into  existence  whenever  Life  is 
regarded  from  a  spiritual  centre,  and  each  individ- 
ual as  the  possessor  of  a  soul  for  which  he  is  re- 
sponsible to  God.  Individual  Responsibility  cannot 
exist  without  individual  Liberty :  for  no  man  must 
control  that  Conscience  for  which  I  alone  am  ac- 
countable to  the  External  Judge.  Where  mine  is 
the  Peril,  mine  must  be  the  Power  over  that  soul 
which  is  to  be  judged  ;  —  and  it  would  be  a  mon- 
strous thought  that  the  Power  should  be  with  one 
man,  and  the  Responsibility  with  another,  —  that 
the  Direction  of  my  spirit  should  be  in  the  hands  of 
those  who,  in  the  last  day,  cannot  take  my  place, 
nor  bear  my  sentence.  If,  then,  Christianity  has 
brought  upon  the  world  the  solemn  feeling  of  Re- 
sponsibility, which  often  lies  heavy  and  oppressive 
on  the  heart,  and  restrains  with  grave  thoughts  the 


140  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

instincts  of  happiness,  yet  let  us  feel  that,  hand  in 
hand  with  this  Christian  sentiment,  comes  the  only- 
true  Freedom  into  the  world,  —  that  the  glorious 
Liberty  of  the  children  of  God  is  the  gift  of  the 
same  spirit,  —  and  that  where  this  sense  of  Respon- 
sibility does  not  exist,  mankind  are  in  a  condition 
to  be  treated  as  children,  or  as  slaves. 

Nor  is  it  necessary  by  argument  so  grave  to  de- 
duce Individual  Liberty  as  a  necessary  consequence 
from  "  the  spirit  of  the  Lord,"  —  for  the  two  senti- 
ments that  belong  to  Christ's  view  of  Life,  and  to 
Moral  Freedom,  are  incapable  of  separation.  If  I 
regard  myself,  and  am  regarded  by  others,  as  a  being 
in  filial  relations  with  God,  seeking  new  brightness 
for  that  Faith  in  all  the  dimness  and  struggle  of  the 
world,  —  and  though  that  discipline,  by  which  God 
tries  how  far  we  trust  him,  striving  ever  with  a 
loyal  heart  to  keep  within  the  Presence  of  divine 
Light  and  Comfort,  —  that  spiritual  aim  cannot 
cross  the  Liberty  of  any  other  child  of  God  desiring 
to  do  likewise,  —  nor  can  it  be  exposed  to  wanton 
restrictions  from  any  who  reverence  the  inward  Law 
of  Conscience,  and  who  acknowledge  themselves  to 
be  independent  members  of  a  spiritual  family,  who 
draw  their  inward  life  from  a  common  Source,  and 
owe  a  common  allegiance  to  its  Lord.  Limitations 
on  Moral  Liberty  can  arise  only  from  some  out- 
ward and  material  view  of  Life ;  —  from  the  licen- 
tious abuse  of  our  Free  Wil]  on  the  one  hand,  or  the 
selfish  tyranny  of  Power  on  the  other ;  and  in  either 
case,  the  Christian  view  of  Life  is  abandoned,  and 
the  spirit  of  the  Lord  is  not  there.      Whether  an 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  141 

abused  Liberty  requires  restraint,  or  an  arbitrary- 
Principle  exerts  authority  wantonly  ;  whether  the 
restriction  is  brought  into  existence  by  the  encroach- 
ment of  a  usurping  Power,  or  by  such  an  arro- 
gance of  Liberty  as  in  effect  to  cross  and  abridge  the 
liberty  of  others  ;  whether  Licentiousness  or  Arbi- 
trariness be  the  forger  of  the  fetter,  —  the  spiritual, 
the  Christian  estimate  of  Man  and  of  his  Destiny 
must  grossly  be  violated,  before  it  can  be  introduced. 
It  is  impossible,  at  one  and  the  same  moment,  to 
contemplate  others  in  the  light  of  Children  of  God, 
seeking  a  spiritual  connection  with  Him  and  doing 
the  "Work  of  Life  beneath  His  eye,  and  to  enter- 
tain the  thought  that  any  third  Power  may  interfere. 
The  sentiment  of  a  spiritual  Life,  and  the  sense  of 
subjection  to  other  Direction  than  God's,  cannot  by 
any  means  be  made  to  coalesce ;  and  when  Christ 
taught  the  Doctrine  of  Personal  Responsibility,  of 
the  spiritual  connections  of  the  Individual  Soul 
with  God,  he  emancipated  Humanity  for  ever.  Oil 
and  water  may  as  soon  flow  together  and  form  one 
crystal  drop,  as  a  Soul  in  living  connections  with 
God  be  in  any  moral  subjection  to  man. 

And  not  alone  in  this  lofty  moral  sense  does 
"  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  "  give  Liberty, —  but  also  in 
matters  where  Conscience  is  not  so  vitally  concern- 
ed, —  in  conventional  matters,  —  in  matters  where 
Usage,  and  Fashion,  and  the  World's  Law,  have 
erected  their  standards,  and  drawn  their  fences. 
Through,  and  against,  these,  the  Life  that  draws  its 
impulse  from  a  spiritual  sentiment  can,  upon  occa- 
sion, make  its  way,  —  without  violence,  indeed,  with- 


142  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

out  contempt,  or  any  offensive  self-assertion,  but  with 
a  very  calm  and  independent  force,  and  with  no  op- 
pressive solicitude  as  to  what  the  children  of  this 
generation,  sitting  in  the  market-place,  may  choose 
to  say.  The  spirit  that  is  conscious  of  an  earnest 
desire  for  communion  with  God,  and  for  working 
sympathy  with  the  meek  and  merciful  Christ,  cannot 
feel  that  Prescription  has  any  right  to  guide  its 
moral  way  through  the  Duties  of  the  world,  —  to 
intrude  into  the  inner  sanctities  of  spiritual  worship 
by  any  demand  for  Conformity  to  established  usage  ; 
—  nor  in  any  other  way  to  disturb  the  spontaneous 
impulses,  and  self-direction,  of  a  Christian  soul.  It 
is  this  that  often  makes  Religion  so  hollow,  so  in- 
sincere, so  stale.  We  are  not  allowed  to  be  relig- 
ious in  a  genuine  way  :  the  inquisitorial  eye  directs 
its  broad  stare  into  the  shrine  of  the  Soul :  and  the 
freshness  of  individual  sentiment  is  the  most  diffi- 
cult of  all  possessions,  in  a  world  where  every  man 
affects  the  right  of  investigating  your  Religion,  pre- 
scribing the  proper  character  of  its  manifestations, 
and  measuring  it  by  some  current  standard  of  the 
times.  Even  those  who  aim  to  be  most  free,  them- 
selves, do  not,  in  this  matter,  always  respect  the 
Freed  Dm  of  others ;  and  can  profess  to  be  scandalized 
by  another's  non-observance  of  Forms  and  Services, 
that  are  genuine  and  efficacious  with  themselves. 
This  is  an  offence  against  Truth  and  Liberty,  —  an 
attempt  to  suffuse  by  the  common  breath  of  Public 
Opinion  the  pure  mirror  of  the  individual  Soul, — 
and  could  proceed  from  no  man,  if  he  reflected  for  a 
moment,  who  reverenced  supremely  "  Truth  in  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  143 

inward  parts j*^  the  spiritual  worship  that  the  Father 
seeketh.  Where  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  is,  there  is 
Liberty  from  all  that  may  be  characterized  as  the 
mere  Mode  of  Religion  ;  —  and  no  offence  against 
the  God  of  Truth  can  be  more  gross  than  that  So- 
cial Persecution,  whether  it  springs  from  opposing 
Chm-ches,  or  from  the  bosom  of  kindred,  which  ex- 
acts External  Conformity,  disregards  the  more  spon- 
taneous impulses  and  manifestations,  and  confuses 
the  sincerity  of  Worship.  Where  the  Heart  is  right 
with  God,  that  is,  earnestly  seeking  to  be  rig-ht,  — 
and  the  Love  that  guided  the  spiritual  Life  of  Christ 
is  acknowledged  as  the  animating  sentiment,  —  let 
the  World,  as  it  reverences  Holiness,  and  Truth,  and 
all  genuine  manifestations  of  Christian  Power,  look 
after  its  own  Salvation,  and  leave  that  spirit  to  wor- 
ship God,  and  bless  mankind,  and  image  Christ,  af- 
ter the  sincerity  of  its  own  nature.  In  this  age  of 
profession,  the  most  devout  of  all  sentiments  is  the 
worship  of  Sincerity,  —  the  reverential  recognition  of 
individual  Truth  and  Christian  Freedom.  And  if  this 
worship  be  true,  it  can  sympathize  with  other  forms 
of  Freedom  than  those  that  are  natural  to  ourselves. 
Let  it  at  the  same  time  be  acknowledged,  that 
the  Liberty  which  is  derived  from  the  Christian 
view  of  Life  is  not  eager  to  assert  itself,  and  rather 
avoids  than  seeks  a  declaration  of  its  Rights.  The 
Christian  Mind  does  not  permit  of  a  dominant  Im- 
pulse, which  stands  out  in  relief,  and  works  in  its 
single  Will ;  it  is  a  tempered  Heart  where  no  fiery 
passions  exert  an  individual  power,  but  where  all 
true  forces  meet  together,  and  produce  that  even 


144  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

movement  which  acknowledges  the  just  sway  of 
each,  —  where  no  forward  faculty  acts  alone  without 
the  softening  guidance  of  the  rest,  —  where  Knowl- 
edge seeks  Light  from  Love,  and  in  its  eagle  flight 
subdues  itself  to  the  temper  of  the  dove,  —  where 
all  thought  of  Self  and  Rights  is  blended  with  mer- 
ciful sympathies,  —  and  the  meekness  of  wisdom 
when  it  appears  in  person,  and  comes  forth  to  act 
and  speak,  is  in  the  form  of  the  Son  of  God,  full  of 
grace  as  of  truth.  Who  can  detect  a  prominent 
faculty,  a  projecting  and  self-asserting  tendency,  in 
that  divine  character?  "Who  would  dare  to  speak 
of  striking  characteristics  in  that  full  perfection  ? 
Even  in  that  intensity  of  Love  which  gave  itself  to 
Death  upon  the  Cross,  there  was  the  passionless  se- 
renity which  ever  shows  the  balance  of  our  Powers. 
Such  is  ever  the  Liberty  of  spiritual  Christianity; 
too  comprehensive  to  be  vehement,  —  too  much  cen- 
tred in  great  interests  to  be  a  separatist  for  small 
ones,  —  too  much  influenced  by  sympathy  to  act 
with  offence. 

When,  for  the  first  time,  a  perception  of  spiritual 
Liberty  entered  among  the  unchastened  elements  of 
Heathen  character,  it  were  too  much  to  expect  that 
there  should  not  be  something  of  extravagance  and 
excess  in  its  immediate  operations.  The  rude  mind 
regards  Liberty  as  a  Law  of  License,  a  Charter  for 
self-will;  —  but  to  the  chastened  heart.  Liberty  is 
Responsibility.  The  sentiment  of  the  one  is,  —  "I 
have  a  Right  to  do  what  I  will " ;  the  sentiment  of 
the  other  is,  — "  My  Free  Will  may  lead  me  and 
others  into  evil,  and  throw  me  out  of  harmony  with 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  145 

God,  —  I  must  guard  the  sources  of  action,  and 
place  my  Liberty  under  a  divine  Guidance."  The 
Liberty  which  has  regard  to  the  Rights  of  self  is 
always  the  form  in  which  the  sentiment /r5^  displays 
itself,  —  and  not  until  the  Christian  and  spiritual 
view  of  Life  rules  the  heart,  do  we  come  to  feel  that 
Liberty  is  a  Responsibility  on  Conscience,  not  a 
Charter  of  Independence  and  wayward  Desire, — 
and  that  the  more  of  Freedom  we  have,  the  more 
anxiously  should  we  place  our  Free  Will  under  the 
highest  guidance  of  Love  and  of  Law. 

It  was  the  first  form  of  Liberty  —  that  partial 
liberation  from  the  control  of  others,  ere  we  put  our- 
selves voluntarily  under  the  control  of  Christian  sen- 
timent—  that  had  taken  possession  of  the  Corin- 
thian Church  in  the  times  of  St.  Paul.  Liberty,  in 
the  first  flush  of  it,  was  enjoyed  as  the  Power  to 
gratify  Self-will,  and  vindicate  personal  Rights.  Su- 
perstition, just  emancipated  from  its  fears,  treated 
with  something  of  a  natural  rudeness  and  scorn  the 
chains  it  had  broken.  It  requires  something  of  the 
spirit  of  Christ  to  deal  respectfully  with  the  moral 
fetters  that  you  have  cast  off  your  own  soul  for  ever ; 
and  the  first  moments  of  liberation  from  the  daily 
and  incessant  anxieties  of  superstitious  worship, 
were  more  likely  to  lead  to  wanton  displays  of  self- 
gratulation,  than  to  tender  sympathy  with  the  neces- 
sities of  minds  still  beneath  the  yoke.  We  have 
already  had  some  instances  of  this  partial  and  wan- 
ton Liberty,  enjoyed  as  a  License,  rather  than  rev- 
erenced as  a  Trust.  The  Corinthian,  just  liberated 
from  the  abject  and  never-ending  bondage  of  an  Idol- 

13 


146  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

atrous  Ritual,  went  in  idle  or  mocking  unconcern  to 
the  Temple  Feast,  and  physically  enjoyed,  where 
before  he  had  spiritually  served  and  trembled.  It 
was  an  irreverent  and  indecent  bravado,  —  the  worst 
reaction  of  Slavery  on  a  coarse  heart,  when  its  bond 
is  broken,  and  the  mean  passions  dare  come  forth. 
We  are  now  to  contemplate  another  instance  of  this 
partial  Liberty  manifesting  itself  violently,  mistaking 
Rights  for  Duties,  and  by  an  eager  forwardness  vio- 
lating the  fulness  of  Christian  sentiment.  Christian- 
ity established  the  equality  of  the  sexes;  and,  by 
restoring  Woman  to  her  place,  removed  the  worst 
description  of  barbarism  and  inhumanity  that  ever 
poisoned  the  sources  of  Civilization.  Slavery  over 
a  race  of  men,  deemed  inferior  by  caste  or  color,  or 
serfs  by  conquest,  would  be  a  light  injury  to  the  heart, 
in  comparison  with  a  Home  where  the  noblest  affec- 
tions trembled  in  vile  dependence,  and  every  tie  of 
Love  was  under  gross  conditions  of  constraint.  In 
the  highest  civilization  of  Greece  there  lurked  that 
savage  element,  and  Woman,  except  when  a  stain 
upon  her  name  gave  pungency  to  prurient  taste,  ap- 
pears not  in  Grecian  History.  But  in  Christ  Jesus 
there  is  neither  male  nor  female,  neither  bond  nor  free. 
The  soul  that  can  hold  an  immediate  connection 
with  God,  has  a  Right  of  independence  of  every 
other  soul.  We  cannot  be  accountable  to  God,  and 
bound  to  man ;  and  where  equal  is  the  responsi- 
bility to  the  Father  of  the  spirit,  equal  must  be  the 
Liberty.  Can  man  be  answerable  for  woman  with 
his  own  soul  at  the  final  bar  of  God  ?  —  and  if  not, 
how  can   he   have  a   Right  over  that  Conscience 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  147 

which   must   answer   for   itself?      But  this    Truth 
should  work  gently,  and  without  violence,   in   the 
deep  heart,  not  produce  rent  and  confusion  in  the 
established  arrangements  of  our  outward  Life.     In 
the  Corinthian  Church  this  spiritual  oneness,  in  re- 
lation to  God,  was  by  some  conceived  to  carry  with 
it  the  abolition  of  all  social  distinctions,  as  if  moral 
equality  implied  sameness  of  place  and  mission  in 
the  world,  —  as  if  the  Duties,   and   aptitudes,   and 
grace  of  Sex,  could  in  any  way  be  relaxed,  because 
its  appropriate  functions  were  now  to  be  discharged 
in  the  meekness  of  freedom,   and  no  longer  under 
the  bondage  of  constraint.    Spiritual  equality  can  in 
no  respect  affect,  or  alter,  the  principles  which  Na- 
ture establishes,  and  the  common  sentiment  makes 
sacred.     Yet  who  can  be  surprised,  when  the  Slave 
breaks  her  chain  and  feels  herself  at  large,  that  she 
should  not  discern  the  moral  bounds  of  her  Liberty, 
with  as  fine  a  tact  as  one  who,  never  conscious  of  re- 
straint, has  long  found  her  blessedness  and  her  power 
within  the  wide  circle  of  her  natural  gifts  and  apti- 
tudes ?     This  tendency  to  excess  was  but  a  broken 
wave  from  the  first  rush  of  long  imprisoned  waters  ; 
and  when  unfretted  by  constraint,  it  returned  again 
to  its  still  fountain  and  quiet  flow,  and  we  hear  of 
it  in   the   Church  no  more.     There  never  has  been 
shown,  on  any  large   scale,  a  tendency  of  Woman 
to    overstep    her   sphere,  —  and  the  tides   of  ocean 
might  sooner  break   from  the  gentle  and  heavenly 
forces   that    measure    their    benignant    movements, 
than  these   aptitudes   of  Nature   suffer  any  general 
violence.    In  fact,  the  single  instance,  in  early  Chris- 


148  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tian  History,  which  the  Corinthian  Church  supplies, 
of  Woman  assuming,  not  an  equality  of  Rights,  for 
that  was  conceded,  but  a  sameness  of  Function  and 
of  outward  manners,  is  mainly  worthy  of  notice  for 
the  great  lesson  it  teaches,  that  excess  and  reaction 
in  an  opposite  direction  are  the  natural  consequences 
of  abridged  Rights.  If  you  dread  encroachments, 
stay  the  restless  temper  by  full  measures  of  Justice. 
If  you  fear  Licentiousness,  give  ample  Liberty. 
The  chain  you  refuse  to  loosen  will  be  a  fearful 
weapon  when  it  is  torn  from  your  hand  by  rude  re- 
venge. The  passage  I  am  about  to  quote  from 
Hase's  account  of  "  The  Public  and  Private  Life  of 
the  Ancient  Greeks"  will  remove  all  surprise  at  a 
momentary  excess,  which  disappeared  almost  imme- 
diately from  Christian  History. 

"  The  female  citizens  of  Athens  were  bound  in 
such  rigid  restraints  of  traditional  usage,  that  their 
resigned  submission  to  these  antiquated  forms  is 
matter  of  no  surprise.  They  grew  up,  guarded  by 
bolts  and  bars,  in  a  seclusion  almost  equal  to  that 
of  an  Eastern  harem.  The  house-door  was  the 
threshold  of  the  forbidden  world  to  an  honorable 
matron ;  and,  to  the  maidens,  it  was  fastened  by  a 
lock  or  seal,  which  was  loosened  with  the  greatest 
solemnity  on  days  of  high  festival,  when  they  walked 
in  procession  with  downcast  eyes." 

"  Nor  did  these  privations  of  their  early  years  re- 
ceive the  smallest  compensation  in  after  life,  from 
the  pleasures  of  freedom  and  of  social  intercourse. 
The  early  marriage  into  which  they  were  often  forced, 
was  generally  dictated  by  considerations  of  family 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  149 

interest;  frequently,  as  in  the  cpse  of  heiresses,  by- 
legal  obligation.  In  a  connection  in  which  speaking 
in  company  was  esteemed  a  sort  of  indecorum,  —  in 
which  to  be  absolutely  unobserved  was,  according 
to  Thucydides,  the  highest  of  all  merits,  and  un- 
conditional submission  to  the  will  or  the  caprice 'of 
their  husbands  the  first  duty  of  Woman,  —  the  decent 
virtues  of  a  housewife  must  necessarily  have  been 
the  only  ones  which  could  be  regarded  with  respect. 
Where,  under  such  circumstances,  any  one  of  those 
talents  that  cheer  and  embellish  existence  unfolded 
itself,  it  must  have  been  the  irrepressible  offspring 
of  Nature,  not  the  foster-child  of  Education.  And 
these  remarks  apply  generally  to  the  States  of  .Ionic 
extraction,  so  long  as  the  ancient  domestic  constitu- 
tion of  society  existed." 

There  is  considerable  obscurity  in  the  details  of 
this  passage  from  the  2d  to  the  end  of  the  16th  verse, 
in  which  St.  Paul  rebukes  that  mistaken  Liberty 
which  led  the  Corinthian  woman  to  speak  in  public 
with  uncovered  head.  In  the  first  place,  there  is  sup- 
posed to  be  an  inconsistency  with  a  passage  in  the 
fourteenth  chapter,  in  which  women  are  absolutely 
forbidden  to  speak  in  the  Church  under  any  circum- 
stances,—  whilst  here  the  prohibition  applies  only  to 
the  uncovered  head.  But  the  question  of  the  Veil, 
or  of  exposure,  contrary  to  all  Grecian  sentiment  of 
propriety,  was  the  only  matter  before  his  mind  ;  and 
he  deals  with  one  point  at  a  time.  It  is  evident  that 
he  had  been  asked  the  question  by  the  Corinthian 
Church,  —  and  he  meets  it  on  his  own  ground,  with- 
out superseding  it  altogether  by  the  introduction  of 

13* 


150  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

another  principle.  He  takes  another  occasion  of  rec- 
ommending Silence:  he  takes  the  present  occasion 
of  meeting  the  direct  question  that  had  been  asked 
him,  whether  the  Veil  should  be  worn.  It  must  be 
remembered,  in  examining  this  passage,  that  we  are 
treading  on  the  shifting  ground  of  arbitrary  notions. 
Decent  respect  for  the  usages  of  Society  is  not  ar- 
bitrary, but  a  permanent  part  of  Christian  Senti- 
ment. But  the  usages  themselves  are  entirely  so ; 
and  consequently  the  sentiment  of  St.  Paul  in  this 
passage  may  be  perfectly  clear,  whilst  the  obser- 
vances referred  to  may  have  so  totally  disappeared 
as  to  render  the  individual  expressions  incapable  of 
accurate  explanation.  Locke  declares  that  some  of 
these  he  does  not  understand ;  and  after  this  it  might 
be  wise  to  pass  them  over,  satisfied  with  extracting 
from  them  the  general  sentiment,  about  which  there 
can  be  no  doubt.  But,  perhaps.  Interpreters  have 
looked  too  deep  for  a  meaning,  and  rejected  the  ob- 
vious ones,  only  because  they  were  not  just  and  nat- 
ural to  their  own  times  and  modes  of  thinking.  I 
understand  St.  Paul  to  discuss  this  question  on  the 
grounds  of  reasoning,  and  on  the  grounds  of  senti- 
ment. Now  the  reasoning  may  be  inconclusive  to 
us,  because  it  proceeds  upon  social  ideas  that  no 
longer  exist, — whilst  the  sentiment  remains  in  force, 
because  it  is  the  permanent  feeling  of  mankind. 

The  Veil  was  the  emblem  of  voluntary  subjec- 
tion, —  and  was  never  thrown  off,  except  by  Grecian 
Priestesses,  when  in  moments  of  inspiration  they 
claimed  communion  with  a  God.  The  flowing  hair 
was  regarded  as  the  Veil  which  Nature  herself  had 


I.    COR.    CHAP.   XI.  151 

provided;  and  the  Grecian  man  avoided  it  as  dis- 
graceful and  unbecoming.  Hence  St.  Paul  argues, 
that  in  the  natural  course,  not  of  their  spiritual  in- 
equality, but  of  the  due  ordering  and  subordination 
of  the  offices  and  functions  that  respectively  belong 
to  them,  it  was  becoming  that  the  man  should  ap- 
pear in  the  Church  with  uncovered  head,  as  the  rep- 
resentative of  Christ,  and  the  woman  covered,  as 
the  representative  of  the  man ;  — the  one  embleming 
the  spiritual  Head,  the  other  the  subjection  of  the 
Disciple ;  —  and  that  Woman  might  with  equal  rea- 
son cast  off  the  Veil  which  Nature  herself  provides, 
and  adopt  the  mode  of  the  man,  as  violate  this  habit. 
And  for  this  reason  ought  the  woman  to  wear  upon 
her  head  the  indication  of  her  voluntary  subjection 
to  lawful  power,  because  of  the  Angels ;  —  according 
to  the  beautiful  sentiment  of  the  Jewish  and  early 
Church,  which  assigned  to  each  individual  an  Angel,* 
whom  they  would  offend  by  license  or  irreverent 
boldness.  These  ideas  may  seem  arbitrary  when 
made  the  grounds  of  a  formal  argument,  but  the 
usage  itself  the  universal  sentiment,  that  most  ir- 
resistible of  all  moral  reasoning,  has  everywhere 
sanctioned.  In  questions  most  vitally  affecting  the 
purity  and  harmony  of  character,  there  is  often  a  felt 
boundary  between  Right  and  "Wrong,  for  which 
Reasoning  can  assign  no  absolute  grounds,  nor  define 
by  palpable  argument,  —  but  which,  nevertheless,  the 
refined  and  educated  sentiments,  the  moral  antenncB 

*  This  seems  doubtful :  but  I  can  find,  or  suggest,  nothing  more  sat- 
isfactory. There  are  guesses  about  spies  and  male  messengers,  but 
with  no  historical  support  or  authentication. 


152  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIAP^S. 

of  the  mind,  determine  with  a  perfect  accuracy ;  — 
nor  can  a  greater  violence  be  done  to  our  nature, 
than  to  resist,  or  be  careless  of,  the  warnings  and 
directions  of  this  involuntary  guide,  which  is  in  fact 
the  finest  and  most  ethereal  judgment  of  the  mind, 
—  the  very  essence  of  our  whol^  spiritual  being, 
coming  into  flower. 

There  were  other  practical  disorders  in  the  Corin- 
thian Church, —  and  St.  Paul  is  naturally  led  to  dis- 
cuss them  in  this  connection.  The  Lord's  Supper  — 
the  Symbol  of  unity,  of  the  one  Body  in  connection 
with  its  Head,  of  the  one  spirit  flowing  through  the 
members  of  the  Church,  of  the  branches  meeting  in 
and  nourished  by  the  one  living  Vine — had  come 
to  be  celebrated  at  Corinth  more  in  the  spirit  of  the 
Factions  that  divided  them,  than  after  the  Pattern 
of  that  last  night,  when  the  Lord,  having  loved  his 
own  which  were  in  the  world,  loved  them  unto  the 
end,  and  having  symbolized  his  connection  with  the 
Church  Universal  by  his  Body,  and  his  spirit  ruling 
and  living  through  it  by  his  Blood,  closed  the  cele- 
bration by  the  Prayer,  "  Holy  Father,  keep  through 
thine  own  name  those  whom  Thou  hast  given  me, 
that  they  may  be  one  even  as  we  are ! "  —  "  Neither 
pray  I  for  these  alone,  but  for  them  also  that  shall 
believe  on  me  through  their  word  ;  that  they  all  may 
be  one ;  as  Thou,  Father,  art  in  me,  and  I  in  Thee, 
that  they  also  may  be  one  in  us ! "  We  have  already 
seen  "that  this  spiritual  unity  did  not  exist  in  the 
Corinthian  Church,  —  that  rival  speculative  preten- 
sions had  sundered  the  inward  tie,  and  so  unchris- 
tian was  the  temper  of  parties,  that  St.  Paul,  in  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  153 

19th  verse,  declares  separations,  even,  to  be  neces- 
sary, in  order  that  the  pure  spirit  of  the  Gospel  may 
not  be  overwhelmed,  but  have  some  manifest  exist- 
ence. In  the  true  spirit  which  it  emblemed,  that 
of  moral  unity  with  Jesus,  the  Lord's  Supper  in 
such  a  Church  could  not  be  kept ;  and  as  the  mys- 
tical view  of  that  memorial  Service,  which  regards 
it  as  a  Sacrament  and  a  Charm,  had  not  yet  come 
into  existence,  nothing  remained  but  that  its  cele- 
bration, if  celebration  there  was,  should  sink  into 
the  gross  abuse  of  a  common  feast.  It  is  painful, 
even  at  this  distance,  and  in  the  cold  way  of  historic 
explanation,  to  have  to  speak  of  sacred  things  pro- 
faned. But  let  the  Truth  be  told :  —  it  may  serve  to 
show,  in  these  days,  how  far  the  primitive  Church 
was  from  entertaining  the  Sacramental  view  of  the 
Lord's  Supper,  —  and  how  far  the  Apostle  was  from 
suggesting  it.  The  Corinthians  followed  what,  we 
learn  from  Xenophon,  was  a  common  custom  at  the 
Suppers  of  the  Greeks,  where  each  individual,  or 
connected  group,  provided  for  themselves ;  and  con- 
sequently, instead  of  brotherhood  and  union,  the 
distinction  of  ranks  and  circumstances  in  a  Church 
was  rendered  peculiarly  and  painfully  prominent. 
Excesses  were  committed  by  the  rich  on  these  occa- 
sions, for  which  some  were  weak,  and  some  sickly, 
and  some  slept  in  death.  This  was  not  to  eat  the 
Lord's  Supper;  it  was  to  profane  the  Church,  and 
shame  the  poor,  and  to  eat  and  drink  judgment 
against  themselves,  desecrating  the  body  of  the  Lord. 
We  can  conceive  that  a  memorial  Service  by  a  peo- 
ple of  such  habits  might  be  thus  abused ;  —  but  it  is 


154  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

impossible  that  such  a  state  of  things  could  have  ex- 
isted if  it  had  been  the  belief  of  the  primitive  Church 
that  the  sacramental  Rite  was  the  mystic  medium 
of  Salvation.  St.  Paul  relates  the  original  Institu- 
tion of  the  Service,  in  order  to  recall  them  to  a  sense 
of  its  spiritual  purposes,  and  of  the  gross  irreverence 
of  confounding  it  with  a  festal  occasion,  —  of  repre- 
senting by  symbols  the  divine  Life  and  self-sacrifi- 
cing Love  of  Christ,  and  then  profaning,  by  disunion 
and  intemperance,  the  emblemed  Body  and  Blood. 
It  is  not  necessary  to  suppose  that  St.  Paul  had  a 
separate  Revelation  of  the  particulars  of  this  Memo- 
rial Service ;  nor  indeed  will  the  words  of  the  orig- 
inal naturally  bear  this  construction.  St.  Paul  had 
received  through  the  sources  of  Apostolic  testimony 
the  words  and  purport  of  the  Lord,  —  and  he  relates 
them  in  almost  verbal  agreement  with  the  statements 
in  the  Gospels. 

One  point  this  whole  passage  does  determine,  — 
namely,  that  this  Memorial  Service  was  not  confined 
to  those  who  witnessed  it,  and  that  it  had  a  fitness 
and  application  out  of  Judea,  and  beyond  the  circle 
of  the  first  Disciples.  It  is  the  only  symbolic  Ser- 
vice, in  its  character  of  a  Church,  which  Christian- 
ity possesses;  and  one  sometimes  wonders  that 
those  who  are  ready  to  complain  of  the  bareness 
of  our  worship,  coldly  hold  themselves  apart  from 
the  breathing  spirit  of  this  Memorial  Act.  And  how 
full  of  significance,  of  deep  life,  are  those  spiritual 
symbols!  To  show  forth  the  Lord's  death  until 
he  come!  Can  we  pass  a  day,  righteously,  merci- 
fully, meekly,  resignedly,  without  the  spirit  of  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XI.  155 

Lord's  Death !  Are  we  sure  that  it  might  not  be 
good  to  watch  with  him  one  hour,  as  in  a  spiritual 
Gethsemane,  before,  in  the  world,  we  incur  the  risk 
of  deserting  him  at  the  Cross  ?  Might  it  not  be  well 
to  bear  about  with  us  the  Dying  of  the  Lord  Jesus, 
that  the  Life  also  of  the  Lord  Jesus  might  be  made 
manifest  in  our  mortal  flesh  ? 

Sad  at  least  it  is,  that  a  Memorial  Act  designed 
by  Christ  to  symbol  spiritual  Union  should  become 
an  occasion  in  which  disunion  is  displayed ! 


PART  III. 

(chaps.  XII. -XIV.) 

THE  OFFICE  OF  LOVE   IN  DRAWING  INDIVID- 
UALS   INTO    A    COMMUNITY;    ENRICHING 
THE  WHOLE   BODY  WITH  THE  GIFTS 
OF  EACH  OF  ITS  MEMBERS. 


14 


PART  III, 

(CHAPTEBS    XII. -XIV. 


SECTION  I. 

UNITY    AMID    DIVERSITY. THE    CHURCH   AND    ITS  MEMBERS, 

AS  THE  BODY  WITH  ITS  ORGANS  AND  LIMBS  I  EACH  ES- 
SENTIAL IN  ITS  PLACE  ;  AND  THE  GIFTS  AND  GRACES  OF 
EACH,    THE    WEALTH    AND   ADORNMENT    OF   ALL. 


CHAP.  XII.    1-30. 


1  Now  concerning  spiritual   things,   brethren,   I   would 

2  not  have  you  ignorant.  Ye  know  that  ye  were  Gen- 
tiles,  carried  away   unto  dumb  idols,  even  as  ye  were 

3  led.  Wherefore  I  give  you  to  understand  that  no  one 
speaking  in  the  spirit  of  God  calleth  Jesus  accursed, 
and  no   one   can   say',   "  Jesus  is  the   Lord,"  but  in  the 

4  holy    spirit.       Now  there   are   diversities   of    gifts,   but 

5  the   same   spirit.     And   there   are   diversities   of  offices, 

6  but  the  same  Lord.  And  there  are  diversities  of  in- 
ward workings,  but  it   is   the   same   God   who  worketh 

7  them   all   in    all.       But  the    manifestation  of  the  spirit 

8  is  given  to  each,  according  to  what  is  expedient.      To 


160  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

one  through  the  spirit   is    given  the   word    of  wisdom  : 

to  another,   the   word  of  knowledge,  according   to   the 

9  same    spirit  :  to   another,  faith,   in  the  same   spirit  :   to 

10  another,  gifts  of  healing,  in  the  same  spirit  :  to  anoth- 
er, the  working  of  mighty  powers :  to  another,  proph- 
ecy :  to  another,  discerning  of  spirits :  to  another,  kinds 
of  tongues  :  and  to  another,  the  interpretation  of  tongues. 

11  But  all  these  worketh  the  one  and  same  Spirit,  distributing 
severally  to  each  as  he  will. 

12  For  as  the  body  is  one,  and  hath  many  members, 
and  all  the  members  of  that  one  body,  being  many,  are 

13  one  body,  so  also  is  Christ.  For  we  were  all  baptized 
in  one  spirit  into  one  body,  whether  Jews  or  Greeks, 
whether   bond  or   free   ;    and   have   all  been  made   to 

14  drink  into  one  spirit.     For  the  body  is  not  one  member, 

15  but  many.  If  the  foot  should  say.  Because  I  am  not  the 
hand  I  am  not   of  the  body,  is  it  therefore   not  of  the 

16  body  ?  And  if  the  ear  should  say.  Because  I  am  not 
the  eye  I  am  not  of  the  body,  is  it  therefore  not  of  the 

17  body  ?  If  the  whole  body  were  an  eye,  where  would  be 
the   hearing  ?     If  the  whole  body  were  hearing,  where 

18  would  the  smelling  be  ?  But  now  God  hath  placed  the 
members,  each  one  of  them  in  the  body,  according  as 

19  it   hath  pleased  Him.     And   if  all   were   one   member, 

20  where  would  the  body  be  ?     Now  are  there  many  mem- 

21  bers,  yet  but  one  body.  The  eye  cannot  say  to  the 
hand,  I   have  no    need  of  thee  :  nor  again  the  head  to 

22  the  feet,  I  have  no  need  of  you.  But  rather,  those  parts 
of  the  body  that  seem  to  be  the  weaker  are  necessary ; 

23  and  upon  those  parts  of  the  body  which  we  think  less 
honorable,  we  bestow  more  abundant  honor,  and  our 
uncomely   parts    have   more   abundant   comeliness ;  but 

24  our  comely  parts  have  no  neejd.  But  God  hath  tempered 
the   body  together,   giving  more  abundant  honor  to  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  161 

25  part  that  needeth,  —  that  there  should  be  no  schism  in  the 
body,  but  that  members  should  have  the  same  care,  one 

26  for  another.  And  if  one  member  suffers,  all  the  mem- 
bers  suffer   with  it :  and  if  one  member  is  honored,  all 

27  the  members  rejoice  with  it.     Now  ye  are  Christ's  body, 

28  and  its  members  severally.  And  God  hath  placed  in  the 
Church,  —  first,  apostles  ;  secondly,  prophets  ;  thirdly, 
teachers;  —  then,  mighty  energies;  then,  gifts  of  heal- 

29  ing,  helps,  governments,  kinds  of  tongues.  Are  all  apos- 
tles ?     Are  all   prophets?    Are  all    teachers?     Are  all 

30  mighty  energies  ?  Have  all  the  gifts  of  healing  ?  Do  all 
speak  in  tongues  ?     Do  all  interpret  ? 


Human  Society,  and  human  History,  when  relig- 
iously regarded,  assume  organized  forms,  of  which 
classes  of  men,  individual  men,  and  individual  eras 
are  but  articulated  members.  The  present  moment 
cannot  be  separated  from  the  past  and  the  future 
Providence  of  God.  It  is  but  a  point  of  transition, 
not  in  itself  a  perfect  and  consistent  whole.  It  is 
unintelligible  without  reference  to  the  Ages  that  are 
gone  :  it  is  mutilated  and  incomplete  without  refer- 
ence to  the  Ages  that  are  come.  History  is  a  vast 
Whole  not  yet  finished,  of  which  the  Eras  are  con- 
nected Parts ;  —  and  Society  is  an  organic  Body, 
of  which  each  individual  man  is  but  a  subordinate 
Member.  Happy  for  him,  if  he  has  found  aright 
his  own  position  in  the  vast  system,  and  is  content- 
ed with  his  functions!  It  must  be  admitted,  in- 
deed, that  this  view  of  the  organic  connections  of 
Time,   and    Human    Growth,   rests   upon  Faith  as 

14* 


162  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

much  as  upon  Knowledge,  — that  it  implies  a  Trust 
in  the  Providence  of  God,  and  that  it  can  be  clear 
only  to  His  Omniscience.  For  we  border  on  the 
Infinite^  when  we  contemplate  the  operations  by 
which  the  Spirit  that  rules  through  all  things  work- 
eth  out  the  destinies  of  Humanity.  Faith  may  re- 
ceive it.  and  even  have  some  insight  into  it ;  but  no 
Intellect  can  reduce  it  to  system,  or  find  in  it  a 
Unity  of  Design.  Who  is  competent  to  discern, 
and  to  unfold,  the  gradual  working  out  of  God's 
great  Plan,  as  it  is  taken  up  and  carried  on  by  the 
successive  generations  of  men!  Who,  through  all 
action  of  the  human  Drama,  —  its  Scene,  the  wide 
Earth,  —  its  Characters,  all  the  pilgrims  of  Mortality 
who  have  lived  their  hour  upon  the  Stage,  —  its  Time, 
from  Creation  to  the  present  hour,  ^  who  is  able 
to  trace  out  an  onward  development  of  the  Plot  of 
Providence  !  Who  will  undertake  to  pass  in  review 
before  us  the.  distinct  Epochs  of  Humanity,  and  de- 
clare to  us  how  the  great  features  that  characterize 
each  are  but  the  several  portions  of  a  connected 
Scheme,  —  and  how,  amidst  diversities  of  opera- 
tions, the  same  guiding  Spirit  is  continuously  con- 
ducting the  Education  of  our  Race  !  And  yet,  the 
discovery  of  such  a  Plan  must  be  possible,  and  to 
God's  mind  manifest,  else  is  there  no  Providence  in 
Heaven.  The  History  of  the  whole  World,  if  we 
could  see  it  in  one  view,  should  present  the  same 
sort  of  connected  growth  and  of  attainment,  the 
same  consistent  flow  of  character,  as  would  the  his- 
tory of  one  mind,  if  we  supposed  it  to  exist  from 
Creation  until  now.     It  is  the  noblest  use  of  History 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  163 

to  afford  materials  for  discovering  this  Plan  of  God 
in  the  Education  of  our  Race,  and  in  that  magnified 
Image  of  man  which  the  large  mirror  of  Time  pre- 
sents, to  trace  the  order  of  succession  in  which  the 
human  mind  passes  to  an  advanced  stage,  and  be- 
comes a  new  reflection  of  the  mind  of  the  Eternal. 
When  this  is  seen  in  History,  then  shall  History  be 
a  new  Bible,  exhibiting  God  continually  working 
out,  over  the  wide  Earth  and  for  Man  Universal, 
those  results  of  Character  which  He  has  indexed  in 
Revelation,  and  prefigured  in  Christ.  Then  only 
shall  we  have  a  Philosophy  of  History,  when  God  is 
seen  in  it.  Then  shall  Providence  display  its  dis- 
tinct outline  and  its  just  proportions  on  that  ample 
sheet,  —  and  each  individual  Man,  perceiving  that 
the  Moral  World  has  a  plan,  that  all  things  progress 
together,  and  that  nothing  hangs  loose,  will  discern 
also  that  himself  is  an  instrument  in  God's  hands, — 
that  faithfulness  of  Life  in  him,  in  every  one,  is  ne- 
cessary to  the  full  accomplishment  of  God's  purposes, 
and  so  will  stir  his  spirit  to  fulfil  his  own  mission, 
and  to  do  his  own  work. 

And,  to  be  in  harmony  with  this  view  of  Provi- 
dence,—  that  God  produces  his  noblest  results  by 
that  organized  Union  of  Members  which  Christian- 
ity calls  a  Church,  —  each  man  must  forego  all  per- 
sonal pretensions,  all  claims  to  individual  indepen- 
dence and  completeness,  and  regard  it  as  his  highest 
distinction  that,  in  the  vast  subdivision  of  human 
service,  he  has  a  functional  place,  where  he  may 
do  needful  work  under  the  eye  of  the  Supreme 
Lord,  and  with  an  humble  and  loving  devotion  to 


164  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

the  common  Good.  Whoever  is  thus  incorporated 
with  the  Social  Body,  lovingly  articulated  into  its 
frame,  —  so  that,  within  his  sphere  of  operation, 
the  loss,  as  of  a  limb  or  member,  would  be  deplored, 
if  his  Mind  thought,  or  his  Hand  wrought,  or  his 
Tongue  spoke,  no  more,  —  is  so  far  in  true  spiritual 
connections  with  both  God  and  Man ;  and  if  he 
holds  this  place,  not  as  a  part  of  a  Machine,  but  with 
the  freedom,  and  love,  and  conscious  insight,  of  a 
devout  Soul,  consecrating  itself  to  a  voluntary  ser- 
vice, he  has  opened  for  himself  the  pure  fountains 
of  unambitious  Duty,  of  unselfish  and  perennial 
Peace  ;  he  has  made  himself  to  be  a  living  Branch 
in  that  Vine  of  which  God  is  the  Husbandman. 

But  there  is  a  tendency  in  human  Nature  to 
undervalue  this  functional  service,  and  to  seek  a 
distinction  more  personal,  —  more  individual  to  our- 
selves, —  so  as  to  stand  out  independently  to  receive 
a  homage  of  its  own,  and  not  be  obscured  and  lost 
in  the  general  community  of  beneficence,  in  the 
silent  workings  of  System.  The  organic  structure 
of  Society  is  disregarded,  and  every  limb  and  mem- 
ber claims  to  be  complete  and  perfect  in  itself.  Our 
gifts  and  graces  are  not  satisfied  to  be  estimated 
relatively  to  an  aggregate  Result,  which  they  con- 
tribute to  produce  ;  but  must  have  a  glory  of  their 
own,  as  if  they  had  in  themselves  an  independent 
existence,  and  were  ultimate  ends  of  God.  That 
only  possible  Mirror  to  us  of  the  perfections  of 
God,  with  the  single  exception  of  the  man  who  was 
His  perfect  image,  —  a  vast  Community,  in  which 
every  variety  of  power,  every  manifestation  of  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  165 

Almighty's  spirit  in  separate  men,  works  in  har- 
mony of  heart  and  for  a  common  Good,  —  is  now 
broken  into  individual  atoms,  —  each  presenting 
only  its  own  poor  and  partial  reflections  of  the  In- 
finite, —  and  this  sublime  image  of  the  Power  and 
Beneficence  of  Deity  is  reduced  to  the  scale  of  a 
single  imperfect  mind.  No  individual  can  ade- 
quately represent  the  Civilization  of  which  he  is 
but  a  part, —  the  organic  Body  of  which  he  is  but 
a  limb.  The  wisest,  and  the  greatest,  of  men  has 
but  the  merest  fraction  of  the  Knowledge  and  the 
Power  that  are  in  the  world,  —  and  the  moment  he 
makes  a  personal  pretension,  or  claims  more  than 
his  functional  place,  he  has  started  aside  from  his 
sphere  of  service,  and  is  guilty  of  that  Sin  by  which, 
it  is  said,  the  Angels  fell. 

The  efforts  of  Ambition,  for  the  mere  love  of  dis- 
tinction, to  stand  out  from  the  body  of  the  Commu- 
nity and  not  be  confounded  with  its  other  members, 

—  the  discontented  spirit,  that  might  derive  Honor 
and  blessed  peace  from  the  faithful  exercise  of  its 
own  Powers  if  it  had  no  envy  of  a  brother's  gifts 
and  place,  —  the  divided  Church,  that  finds  sources 
of  sectarian  bitterness  and  selfish  alarm  in  the  spir- 
itual varieties  that,  if  properly  understood,  would 
afford  the  requisite  materials  of  its  own  Univer- 
sality and  fulness  of  strength, —  the  partial  Interests, 
that  everywhere  neglect  and  disorganize  the  Com- 
munity, while  they  seek  a  Monopoly  for  themselves ; 

—  all  these  are  examples  of  the  tendency  which 
Human    Nature,   in  its  unspiritual   states,  exhibits, 

—  the  tendency  to  make  individual  pretensions  more 


166  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

prominent  than  the  Universal  Good,  to  sacrifice  the 
Body  to  the  Members.  Human  Nature,  in  the  ex- 
traordinary awakening,  in  the  rush  of  new  spiritual 
Life  which  characterized  the  first  age  of  Christianity, 
was  not  altogether  in  a  natural  state,  —  nor  in  that 
'condition  of  liability  to  selfish  temptations,  which 
may  be  considered  as  its  normal  form.  Neverthe- 
less, under  all  variety  of  external  influence,  the  same 
spirit  betrays  itself  with  more  or  less  violence.  And 
it  is,  perhaps,  not  more  reasonable  to  expect  that 
all  exclusiveness  of  aim  should  disappear,  when  God 
pours  out  His  Spirit  to  regenerate  the  heart  of  Life, 
and  endows  his  servants  with  the  rare  gifts  of  utter- 
ance and  spiritual  energy  by  which  a  new  Faith  and 
Worship  are  established  in  the  World,  than  when 
under  his  natural  Providence  He  distinguishes  his 
Agents  by  peculiar  gifts  and  energies,  and  seeks, 
with  an  impartiality  equally  unlimited  as  the  Gos- 
pel's Grace,  the  same  result  of  Universal  Good  from 
the  same  diversity  of  Individual  Endowments.  The 
Corinthian  Christians  acted  with  the  same  narrow, 
and  ostentatious,  individuality  under  extraordinary 
circumstances,  as  other  men  do  under  ordinary  cir- 
cumstances, —  and  certainly  the  whole  Scripture 
History  leads  us  to  attach  no  signal  efficacy  for 
sanctifying  and  exalting  human  nature  to  outward 
Wonders,  —  but  shows  that  even  the  good  seed, 
though  sown  by  the  hand  of  God  himself,  must 
fall  also  upon  the  good  soil,  before  it  bears  fruit  a 
hundred-fold. 

That  it  was  less  excusable  in  a  primitive  Chris- 
tian than  it  is  in  a  modern  Christian,  to  regard  his 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  167 

individual  endowments  as  sources  of  personal  glory 
rather  than  as  instruments  in  God's  hands  to  estab- 
lish the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  upon  Earth,  and  be- 
yond that,  nothing  in  themselves,  —  is  an  opinion 
that  ascribes  to  extraordinary  influences,  to  mirac- 
ulous interferences,  a  moral  power  to  subdue  and 
purify  the  ordinary  passions,  which  nothing  in  the 
Gospel  History  would  lead  us  to  attribute  to  such 
an  influence.  A  gift  direct  from  God  may  inflame 
individual  pretension  and  self-love,  and  convert  the 
mere  instrument  of  his  Providence  into  the  inflated 
favorite  of  Heaven,  with  even  more  of  strong  delu- 
sion than  the  rarest  powers,  or  the  most  eminent 
attainments,  disciplined  by  education,  and  acquired 
by  toil,  that  come  to  us  in  the  natural  way,  and  do 
not  separate  us  from  the  common  necessities  of  men. 
How,  it  is  asked  in  astonishment,  could  men  like 
Judas  and  Peter,  associates  of  Christ,  and  witnesses 
of  Miracles,  be  base  and  false  ?  —  or,  like  the  prim- 
itive Church,  gifted  with  inspired  utterance  and 
Apostolic  powers,  be  vain,  selfish,  ostentatious,  un- 
charitable ?  St.  Paul,  at  least,  saw  nothing  impos- 
sible in  the  coexistence  of  such  qualities,  —  for  it  is 
a  supposition  that  he  makes  himself,  —  "  Though  I 
speak  with  the  tongues  of  men  and  angels  and  have 
not  charity,  I  am  but  as  sounding  brass  or  a  tink- 
ling cymbal.  "  And  surely  in  our  own  day,  and  to 
our  own  hearts,  we  may  put  the  parallel  question, — 
How  is  it  that  men  taught  by  Christ,  habituated 
from  their  earliest  years  to  the  idea  of  a  Communi- 
ty in  which  one  spirit,  and  one  law,  represent  the 
Reign  of  God  among  His  children  of  Earth,  should 


168  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

manifest  such  regard  for  individual  interests,  such 
avidity  for  individual  distinctions,  such  strong  sub- 
jection to  selfish  aims  and  passions?  Or  how  is 
it  that  those  who  noio  believe  themselves  to  be  in 
more  intimate  communion  with  God,  —  to  be  on  "  a 
higher  religious  level "  than  other  men,  —  should  live 
perpetually  in  the  angry  heat  of  unimportant  con- 
troversy, and  manifest  so  little  of  the  Catholic  and 
Apostolic  spirit  which  would  reunite  the  Church, 
and  gather  into  one  Body,  as  Members  of  Christ, 
all  those  who,  inasmuch  as  with  sincerity  they  call 
"  Jesus  their  Lord,"  would  be  acknowledged  by  St. 
Paul  "  to  speak  in  the  spirit  of  God."  "  No  man 
can  say  that  Jesus  is  the  Lord  but  in  the  Holy 
Spirit " ;  —  some  divine  sentiment  must  be  in  the 
heart  that  recognizes  the  divine  in  Christ,  —  and  all 
in  whom  that  recognition  livingly  exists  are  in  saving 
communion  with  him,  and,  under  the  Gospel  con- 
ception, are  members  of  the  new  spiritual  Family 
of  God. 

The  Corinthians,  with  the  self-love  of  our  Nature 
when  unsanctified  by  the  inner  spirit  of  the  Gospel, 
took  the  individual  view  of  Life,  as  if  each  man  was 
complete  and  independent  in  himself;  and  regarded 
their  personal  properties  and  gifts,  not  as  instru- 
ments that  were  to  work  together  for  a  common 
good,  each  indispensable,  yet  each  nothing  without 
the  rest,  —  but  as  rival  Endowments,  —  matters  for 
jealous  comparisons,  —  sources  of  self-importance. 
St.  Paul  reminds  them  of  the  Time  when  they  were 
all  equal  in  their  Heathenism,  —  when  the  dumb 
Idol  awake  no  divine  spirit  in  any  of  them,  —  when 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  169 

no  voice  of  God  spoke  through  them,  —  when  there 
was  the  leaden  sameness  of  spiritual  insensibility 
and  death.  And  as  then  they  were  all  on  a  level, 
in  the  absence  of  the  Spirit,  —  all  in  that  common 
blindness,  that  with  one  voice  they  would  have  called 
Jesus  accursed,  —  so  now,  when  the  energy  of  the 
Most  High  had  penetrated  them  with  its  living 
Spirit,  and  was  manifesting  its  infinite  variety  ac- 
cording to  the  individualities  and  natural  aptitudes 
of  different  men, —  making,  according  to  their  fit- 
nesses, some  Apostles,  some  Prophets,  some  Teach- 
ers, —  giving  to  one  the  word  of  Wisdom,  to  anoth- 
er the  word  of  Knowledge,  to  another  the  gift  of 
Tongues,  —  were  those  workmen  of  the  Lord,  thus 
brought  by  Grace  out  of  the  uniformity  of  Death 
into  the  diversity  of  Life,  instead  of  joining  together 
their  hearts  and  hands  to  build  up  the  Church  (that 
spiritual  Temple  framed  of  living  stones),  to  stand 
apart  in  their  rival  individualities,  discussing  the 
comparative  importance  of  their  several  gifts  and 
powers  ?  They  were  spiritually  dead,  and  dumb  as 
their  Idols,  in  their  Heathen  state ;  and  now,  when 
the  Spirit  of  God  spake  and  wrought  through  them, 
was  Self-glory  to  forget  His  purposes,  and  commence 
its  own  wretched  strife  ?  "  There  are  diversities  of 
Gifts,  —  but  they  cannot  enter  into  individual  com- 
petition, for  one  Spirit  gave  them  all.  There  are 
differences  of  Offices,  but  all  contributing  Xo  a  com- 
mon Result,  and  in  subordination  to  the  safne  Lord ; 
there  are  diversities  of  Energies,  but  it  is  the  same 
God  who  works  in  each,  and  binds  all  together. 
And  the  manifestation  of  the  Spirit  has  this  variety 

15 


170  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

of  forms,  according  to  the  predominant  capability 
of  the  individual,  for  the  benefit  of  the  whole :  the 
manifestation  of  the  Spirit  is  given  to  Each,  accord- 
ing to  the  Law  of  the  Common  Good." 

We  must  not  altogether  sacrifice  the  less  inter- 
esting duties  of  an  Interpreter,  for  the  sake  of  pur- 
suing the  view  that  is  here  opened  to  us,  of  the  or- 
ganized nature  of  every  Christian  Community.  God 
has  regard  for  the  Individual,  —  mental  Peculiarities 
are  not  annihilated  by  Him ;  He  finds  an  office  and 
a  place  for  all,  but  one  Soul  of  Love  must  guide  and 
combine  the  whole,  as  one  Will  directs  the  planning 
Thought,  and  moves  the  executing  Hand :  and  all 
individuals  must  regard  themselves  as  "  forming 
reciprocal  complements  to  each  other,  as  parts  of 
one  vast  whole  in  the  Kingdom  of  God." —  It  is  not 
possible  to  define  the  functions  of  the  several  Indi- 
vidualities of  Office  and  Operation,  to  which  St.  Paul 
assigns  a  place  in  the  administration  of  the  Early 
Church.  Some  of  these  relate  to  the  vivid  commu- 
nication of  Spiritual  Energy,  which  a  Soul  deeply 
moved  itself  can  impart  to  others ;  some,  to  the  more 
practical  qualifications  for  the  wise  government  and 
direction  of  a  Church,  at  every  moment  liable  to 
fatal  collisions ;  —  and  some,  to  interior  details  of 
mutual  assistance  and  cooperation,  the  particulars  of 
which  have  for  ever  escaped  us. 

"The  word  of  Wisdom"  we  find  distinguished 
from  "the  word  of  Knowledge."  The  first  corre- 
sponds with  our  ideas  of  practical  Instruction,  and 
denoted  the  application  of  Christian  Truth  to  the 
various  relations  of  Life,  and  the  exercise  of  Chris- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  171 

tian  Prudence  in  the  collisions  of  the  new  Spirit 
with  existing  Social  Institutions;  whilst  the  word 
of  Knowledge  implied  a  more  abstract  and  syste- 
matic Power,  and  presented  Religion  under  a  The- 
oretic view.  The  precepts  and  parables  of  Jesus 
might  be  regarded  as  his  "  Word  of  Wisdom,"  — 
and  some  portions  of  the  Gospel  of  St.  John  as  his 
deeper  "  Word  of  spiritual  Knowledge."  * 

The  gift  of  Tongues,  and  the  interpretation  of 
Tongues,  are  described  as  portions  of  the  instru- 
mental Power  of  the  Early  Church,  —  and  along 
with  these  are  always  mentioned,  as  in  contradis- 
tinction, the  Teacher  and  the  Prophet.  If  we  take 
the  Epistles  as  our  basis,  which  are  of  earlier  date 
than  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  we  must  abandon 
the  common  opinion  that  the  Gift  of  Tongues  im- 
plied a  miraculous  power  of  speaking  in  Foreign 
Languages,  with  the  view  of  facilitating  among  all 
nations  a  more  rapid  diffusion  of  the  Gospel.  In 
the  Epistles,  this  "  Gift "  seems  always  to  refer  to 
the  utterance  of  an  elevated,  and  even  ecstatic,  state 
of  mind,  in  which  the  language  of  Emotion  tran- 
scends the  style  of  ordinary  communication,  and  to 
a  mind  cold  and  unsympathizing  would  border  on 
the  obscure.  In  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  also, 
"  speaking  in  Tongues "  is  always  attributed  to 
minds  in  the  first  glow  of  conversion,  —  under  the 
freshest  influences  of  Faith, —  when  pouring  forth, 
not  without  excitement,  the  new  feelings  of  spiritual 
Life  with  which   their  hearts  were   filled ;    and   in 

*  Billroth. 


172  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

such  circumstances  it  is  always  described  as  taking 
the  form  of  rapt  prayers,  singing  the  praises,  and 
showing  forth  the  mighty  work  of  God  in  the  be- 
liever's heart.  Thus  in  the  fourteenth  chapter  of  this 
Epistle  (at  the  2d  and  28th  verses),  he  that  speaketh 
with  Tongues  is  said,  not  to  speak  unto  men,  but 
unto  God,  because  he  speaketh  Mysteries  in  the 
spirit ;  —  whereas  he  that  prophesieth  speaketh  unto 
men  for  edification,  and  exhortation,  and  consola- 
tion; and  unless  there  is  an  Interpreter  present 
who  can  reduce  his  inspired  and  ecstatic  utterance 
to  intelligible  language,  he  is  enjoined  "to  keep 
silence  in  the  Church,  and  to  speak  only  to  himself 
and  to  God."  This  cannot  be  made  to  consist  with 
the  common  interpretation  of  speaking  in  a  foreign 
Language ;  and  as  tongues,  or  glosses^  was  a  com- 
mon expression  for  forms  of  speech  strange  and  un- 
intelligible, for  peculiar  dialects,  it  would  seem  to  be 
used  for  "  the  new  language  of  that  holy  fire  which 
was  kindled  in  the  hearts  of  believers,"  —  for  "  the 
utterance  of  the  new  emotions  with  which  the  raised 
mind  would  be  filled,  in  the  new  and  more  elevated 
language  of  a  heart  fresh  glowing  with  Christian 
Sentiment."*  There  is  undoubtedly  a  difficulty  in 
harmonizing  the  account  of  the  day  of  Pentecost, 
in  the  second  chapter  of  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles, 
with  this  interpretation:  but  in  the  first  place,  the 
gift  of  Tongues  in  the  Epistles  will  not  bear  the 
meaning  of  speaking  in  Foreign  Languages,  —  and 
in  the  second,  the  passage  in  the  Acts  is  involved  in 

*  The  "  Gift  of  Tongues  "  often  seems  to  signify  the  natural,  inar- 
ticidate  language  of  rapt  emotion. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  173 

inextricable  difficulties  by  the  common  interpreta- 
tion. For  example,  — "  It  cannot  possibly  be  sup- 
posed that  all  the  nations  who  heard  the  disciples 
speaking  with  the  new  tongues  of  the  Spirit,  used 
different  languages ;  for  it  is  certain  that  in  the  cities 
of  Cappadocia,  Pontus,  Lesser  Asia,  Paraphylia, 
Phrygia,  Cyrene,  and  in  the  parts  of  Lybia  and 
Egypt  inhabited  by  Jewish  and  Grecian  Colonies, 
the  Greek  would  at  that  time  be  better  understood 
than  the  ancient  language  of  the  country ;  and  as 
this  must  have  been  known  to  the  writer  of  the 
Acts,  he  could  not  have  intended  to  specify  so  many 
diflferent  languages."  *  Again,  it  is  remarkable,  and 
fatal  to  the  common  interpretation,  that  the  inhab- 
itants of  Judea  are  included  among  those  who  heard 
the  Disciples  speaking  in  the  new  tongues  of  the 
Spirit.  Moreover,  in  the  history  of  the  first  propa- 
gation of  Christianity,  no  traces  are  found  of  a  su- 
pernatural Power  of  speaking  in  foreign  Languages. 
Indeed,  the  close  intercourse  then  subsisting  between 
all  the  provinces  of  the  Roman  Empire,  and  the  uni- 
versal prevalence  of  the  Greek  Language,  superseded 
the  necessity  for  such  a  miracle.  And  •'  as  to  the 
Greek  Language,  it  is  certain  that  the  mode  in  which 
the  Apostles  express  themselves  in  it,  and  the  traces 
of  their  Mother- Tongue  which  appear  in  their  use  of 
it,  prove  that  they  had  obtained  their  knowledge  of 
it,  according  to  the  natural  laws  of  lingual  acquire- 
ment." We  can  only  suppose,  then,  as  the  account 
in  the  Epistles  is  the  older  of  the  two,  that  some- 

*  Neander,  —  "  The  Planting  and  Training  of  the  Christian  Church." 
15* 


174  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

thing  of  a  symbolic  and  mythical  character  has  min- 
gled with  the  narrative  in  Acts  ;  or,  what  appears  to 
me  highly  probable,  that  all  the  foreign  Jews  pouring 
forth  in  their  own  dialects,  as  the  most  natural  to  an 
excited  mind,  with  a  rapt  enthusiasm,  the  new  expe- 
riences by  which  they  were  moved  to  the  very  depths 
of  their  natures,  were  afterwards  viewed  as  an  Em- 
blem "  that  the  new  and  divine  Sentiment  would  re- 
veal itself  in  all  the  Languages  of  Mankind,  as  Chris- 
tianity is  destined  to  bring  under  its  sway  all  nation- 
al peculiarities,"  —  and,  in  relation  to  God,  to  fill 
Mankind  with  one  voice  and  one  spirit. 

As  it  may  be  well  to  support  this  view  by  some 
unsuspected  authority,  I  shall  quote  a  passage  from 
Neander,  in  which  he  attempts  to  define  the  charac- 
teristic differences  of  the  Prophet,  the  Teacher,  and 
the  Speaker  in  tongues  :  — 

"  It  is  evident  what  influence  the  power  of  in- 
spired discourse,  operating  on  the  heart,  must  have 
had  for  the  spread  of  the  Gospel  during  this  period. 
Persons  who  wished  for  once  to  inform  themselves 
respecting  what  occurred  in  Christian  assemblies, 
or  to  become  acquainted  with  the  Christian  doc- 
trine, of  whose  divine  origin  they  were  not  yet 
convinced,  sometimes  came  into  the  assemblies  of 
the  Church.  On  these  occasions  Christian  men 
came  forward  who  testified  of  the  corruption  of  hu- 
man nature,  and  of  the  universal  need  of  redemp- 
tion, with  overpowering  energy;  and  from  their 
own  religious  and  moral  consciousness  appealed  to 
that  of  others,  as  if  they  could  read  it.     The  heathen 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XII.  175 

felt  his  conscience  struck,  his  heart  laid  open,  and 
was  forced  to  acknowledge,  what  hitherto  he  had 
not  been  willing  to  believe,  that  the  Power  of  God 
was  with  this  Doctrine,  and  dwelt  among  these  men. 
If  the  connected  addresses  of  the  Teacher  tended  to 
lead  those  farther  into  a  knowledge  of  the  Gospel 
who  had  already  attained  unto  Faith,  and  to  develop 
in  their  minds  a  clearer  understanding  of  what  they 
had  received,  — '■  the  Prophet  served  rather  to  awaken 
those  to  Faith  who  were  not  yet  believers,  or  to  ani- 
mate and  strengthen  those  who  had  attained,  and  to 
quicken  afresh  the  life  of  Faith.  On  the  contrary, 
to  one  *  speaking  in  tongues ^^  the  elevated  conscious- 
ness of  God  predominated,  whilst  the  consciousness 
of  the  external  world  vanished.  —  What  he  uttered 
in  this  state,  when  carried  away  by  his  feelings  and 
intuitions,  was  not  a  connected  address  like  that  of 
a  Teacher,  nor  was  it  an  exhortation  suited  to  the 
circumstances  of  other  persons,  like  that  of  the  Proph- 
ets ;  but  without  being  capable,  in  this  condition,  of 
taking  notice  of  the  mental  states  and  necessities  of 
others,  he  was  occupied  solely  with  the  relations  of 
his  own  heart  to  God.  His  soul  was  absorbed  in 
devotion  and  adoration.  Hence  prayer,  singing  the 
praises,  testifying  the  mighty  workings  of  God,  were 
suited  to  this  state.  Such  a  person  prayed  in  the 
Spirit ;  the  higher  life  of  the  mind  and  disposition 
predominated,  but  the  intelligent  development  was 
wanting.  —  Had  St.  Paul  held  the  *  speaking  in 
tongues'  to  be  something  quite  enthusiastic  and 
morbid,  he  would  never  have  allowed  himself  to  des- 
ignate by  the  name  of  a  spiritual  gift  an  imperfection 


176  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

in  the  Christian  Life, but  it  was  consonant 

with  that  wisdom  which  took  account  of  the  inter- 
ests of  all  classes  in  the  Church,  that  he  ...  .  left 
the  manifestations  of  such  moments  to  the  private 
devotions  of  each  individual,  and  banished  them  from 
meetings  for  general  edification  ;  that  he  valued  more 
highly  those  spiritual  gifts  which  gave  scope  for  the 
harmonious  cooperation  of  all  the  powers  of  the  soul, 
and  contributed  in  the  spirit  of  Love  to  the  general 
edification  ;  and  that  he  dreaded  the  danger  of  self- 
deception  and  enthusiasm,  where  the  extraordinary 
manifestations  of  Christian  life  were  overvalued,  and 
where  that  which  was  only  of  worth  when  it  arose 
unsought,  from  the  interior  development  of  life, 
became  an  object  of  anxious  pursuit  to  many,  w^ho 
were  thus  brought  into  a  state  of  morbid  excitement. 
Hence  he  wished  that  [in  such  moments]  every  one 
would  pour  out  his  heart  alone  before  God  ;  but  that, 
in  the  assemblies  of  the  Church,  these  manifestations 
of  devotion,  unintelligible  to  the  majority,  might  be 
repressed,  or  only  be  exhibited  when  what  was  thus 
spoken  could  be  translated  into  a  language  intelligi- 
ble to  aU."  * 

Whatever  obscurity  may  attach  to  these  details 
of  Christian  Antiquity,  the  great  spiritual  and  provi- 
dential View  into  which  they  are  introduced  as  sub- 
ordinate illustrations,  is  still  full  of  the  clearest  and 
freshest  truth,  —  and  of  truth  which  the  World,  like 
the  Corinthians,  in  the  strength  of  selfish  partialities, 

*  "The  Planting  and  Training  of  the  Christian  Church."  —  J5t6- 
lical  Cabinet, 


I.    COR.    CHAP.   XII.  177 

still  neglects.  The  world  requires  nothing  more  than 
for  some  Christian  Apostle  again  to  lift  his  voice,  — 
"  Now,  concerning  spiritual  gifts.  Brethren,  and  all 
other  gifts  of  God,  I  would  not  have  you  to  be 
ignorant.  There  are  diversities  of  gifts,  but  all  from 
the  same  Spirit ;  and  his  own  peculiar  manifesta- 
tion of  the  Spirit  is  given  to  each,  for  the  profit  of 
the  whole.  And  as  the  human  body  is  one,  although 
it  hath  many  members,  and  all  the  members  make 
but  one  body,  so  also  is  it  with  the  Church  of  Christ. 
Be  satisfied,  that  you  serve  the  Community,  whether 
with  the  directing  mind,  or  the  inspired  utterance,  or 
the  working  hand.  All  have  not  the  same  gifts  or 
functions,  but  all  may  be  members  set  in  the  Body 
by  God  himself.  Dread  nothing  except  to  have  no 
place  in  the  body,  and  to  be  cast  out  as  a  withered 
brianch,  or  a  dead  limb.  But  if  you  live,  and  do 
work,  God  hath  tempered  the  Body  together,  that  all 
the  members  are  mutually  dependent,  and  must  have 
the  same  care  one  for  another,  —  so  that  if  one  mem- 
ber suffer,  all  the  members  suffer  wiY/i  it;  or  if  one 
member  be  honored,  all  the  members  rejoice  with  it." 

A  combination  of  the  gifts,  and  powers,  and  pecu- 
liarities, of  all  individuals,  makes  a  perfect  Commu- 
nity, —  as  the  freely  contributed  gifts  of  all  climes 
and  soils  would  make  the  wide  Earth  a  perfect  and 
blessed  Home  for  that  family  of  God. 

Would  to  God  that  the  spirit  of  exclusion,  in  every 
corner  of  this  World  which  calls  itself  Christian, 
would  take  the  Apostolic  Doctrine  to  its  heart ! 


178  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION  II. 

LOVE  THE  SOUL  OF  ALL  THAT  IS  GOOD  AND  GREAT  :  ITS  CHAR- 
ACTERISTICS.   THE  HIGHEST  SENTIMENT  IN  SPIRITUAL 

MAN,  AS  THE  ONLY  ONE  COMMON  TO  US  AND  TO  GOD  HIM- 
SELF, AND  THEREFORE  ABOVE  HOPE  AND  ABOVE  FAITH. 


CHAPS.  XII.  31— XIII.   1-13. 

XII.  31.    Be  zealous  after   the  best  gifts  ;  and  yet  I  show 

XIII.  1.  unto  you  a  more  excellent  way.  Though  I 
speak  in  the  tongues  of  men,  and  of  angels,  and  have  not 
Love,  I  am  become  sounding  brass  or  a  tinkling  cymbal. 

2  And  though  I  have  prophecy,  and  know  all  mysteries 
and  all  knowledge,  and  though  I  have  all  faith,  so  as  to 

3  move  mountains,  and  have  not  Love,  I  am  nothing.  And 
though  I  give  all  my  goods  to  feed  the  poor,  and  though 
I  give  my  body  to  be  burned,  and  have  not  Love,  I  am 

4  profited  nothing.  Love  sufFereth  long,  and  is  kind :  Love 
envieth  not:  Love  vaunteth  not  itself;  is  not  puffed  up  ; 

5  doth  not  behave  itself  unseemly  ;  seeketh  not  its  own  ;  is 

6  not  easily  provoked  ;   thinketh  no  evil  ;  rejoiceth  not  in 

7  iniquity,  but  rejoiceth  in  the  truth ;  covereth  all  things  ; 
believeth    all   things ;    hopeth   all    things ;    endureth   all 

8  things.  Love  never  faileth.  But  whether  prophecies, 
they  shall  come  to  an  end  ;  whether  tongues,  they 
shall  cease  ;  whether  knowledge,  it  shall  come  to  an  end. 

9  For  we  know  in   part,  and  we   prophesy   in  part.     But 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  179 

10  when  that   which  is   perfect   is   come,   then   that  which 

11  is  in  part  shall  come  to  an  end.  When  I  was  a  child, 
I  spoke  as  a  child,  I  understood  as  a  child,  I  thought 
as   a   child  :  but   when   I  became    a   man,  I   put   away 

12  childish  things.  For  now  we  see  as  by  a  glass,  in 
hints;  but  then  face  to  face.  Now  I  know  in  part, 
but    then   shall    I   know,   even    as   I   also    am    known. 

13  And  now  abideth  Faith,  Hope,  Love,  these  three  :  but 
the  greatest  of  them  is  Love. 


The  Unity  of  Spirit  apparent  in  Creation  is  the 
highest  evidence  of  the  presence  of  a  pervading 
God.  One  Will  must  be  the  Author  and  Ruler  of 
a  Universe,  amid  whose  infinite  variety  of  kingdoms 
and  regions  there  are  no  conflicting  Purposes,  and 
no  inconsistencies  of  Law.  This  is  not  merely  the 
argument  from  Design,  which,  from  observing  the 
adaptation  of  means  to  ends,  and  organs  to  func- 
tions, and  faculties  to  the  media  through  which  they 
act,  infers  that  there  is  a  great  Mechanician  in  the 
Heavens ;  —  for  all  that  this  Argument  from  design 
establishes  is  an  intellectual  God,  with  a  Power  and 
Goodness  commensurate  with  what  appears  in  His 
works.  It  is  good  thus  far :  —  "  ij^  the  World  pro- 
ceeded from  an  originating  Mind,  then  it  affords 
evidences  that  it  is  the  work  of  an  Intelligence  pos- 
sessed of  kindred  qualities  to  that  which  we  call 
Design  in  Man.  But  in  this  Argument,  the  only 
theological  part  of  it  is  taken  for  granted.  If  a  liv- 
ing God  created  this  World,  then  the  Argument 
from  Design  comes  in  to   prove  the  commensurate 


180  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

depths  of  his  Wisdom  and  resources  of  his  Power ; 
but  it  is  of  no  logical  force  to  establish  the  funda- 
mental assumption,  that  wherever  there  are  to  us  the 
signs  of  Design,  there  must  have  been  a  prior  Crea- 
tor. For  if  this  argument  is  valid,  then  how  can  we 
avoid  applying  it  to  God  himself?  If  Design  ne- 
cessarily implies  a  prior  Designer, —  then  what  bears 
such  evidences  of  Design  as  the  Constitution  of  a 
Mind  ?  The  Universe  itself  is  not  so  wonderful 
for  the  compass  of  its  harmonies.  The  World  is 
not  so  full  of  the  evidences  of  Design,  as  is  the  Mind 
of  God :  —  by  what  valid  argument  do  we  infer  a 
previous  Designer  in  the  one  case,  and  not  in  the 
other  ? 

As  a  demonstration  even  of  the  existence  of  Deity, 
this  whole  Argument  from  Design  cannot,  we  think, 
be  regarded  as  successful ;  nor  any  other  of  the 
philosophical  reasonings  of  Natural  Theology :  — 
they  all  proceed  upon  logical  assumptions  which 
cannot  be  proved.  If  it  be  said,  that  we  have  but 
the  alternatives  of  an  eternally  existing  Universe, 
or  of  an  eternally  existing  God,  and  that  the  latter  is 
the  more  reasonable,  —  then  it  is  obvious  to  reply, 
that  where  both  are  incomprehensible  there  is  no 
logical  choice,  —  no  logical  probabilities  ;  —  what- 
ever grounds  there  may  be  for  a  moral  conviction, 
a  spiritual  belief.  In  fact,  our  path  to  God  lies  not 
through  the  reasoning  powers.  Intellect  proceeds 
from  definite  premises,  and  ends  in  definite  and 
measured  results.  It  can  argue  only  from  what  it 
comprehends,  from  fixed  points,  —  and  it  is  a  well- 
known  logical   principle,  that  a  conclusion  cannot 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.   XII.,  XIII.  181 

contain  more  than  the  premises  from  which  it  is 
drawn.  From  the  comprehensible  you  cannot  logi- 
cally deduce  the  Incomprehensible,  —  nor  from  the 
finite  the  Infinite.  It  is  impossible,  then,  that  the 
finite  premises  of  human  comprehension  and  expe- 
rience should  logically  involve  the  infinite  and  in- 
comprehensible God.  God  is  revealed  to  the  highest 
faculties  in  man  :  but  these  are  not  the  logical  ones, 
which  are  conversant  only  with  definite  measure- 
ments. But  the  moral  God,  the  Father  of  spirits,  is 
spiritually  discerned.  The  Soul  conceiveth  Him,  — 
the  Spirit  taketh  hold  on  Him  :  —  through  the  sen- 
timent of  a  divine  Faith,  and  not  the  discovering 
force  of  an  all-sufficient  Argument,  have  we  access 
to  and  communion  with  Him.  By  the  spiritual 
path  He  admits  us  into  His  presence  : — when  we 
attempt  the  intellectual  one,  wfe  fall  back  into  our 
own  littleness,  —  for  knowledge  is  human  and  de- 
fined. There  is  perhaps  no  real  resemblance  be- 
tween the  Intellect  of  Man  and  the  Mind  of  God, 
between  the  creative  source  of  Truth  and  Power 
and  the  mere  observing  and  receptive  mind,  that 
slowly  traces  out  some  indefinitely  small  portion  of 
their  manifestations,  —  that  originates  nothing,  but 
only  deciphers,  and  painfully  spells  out  a  little 
of  what  the  mighty  Author  has  written  in  Nature* 
But  in  all  moral  and  spiritual  qualities,  there  is  a 
oneness  of  kind,  even  between  perfection  and  imper- 
fection, —  even  between  God  and  Man.  The  affec- 
tions are  of  the  same  character  ;  —  they  are  touched 
by  the  same  spirit,  —  they  suggest  the  same  senti- 
ments, —  they  dictate  the  same  actions,  —  they  are 

16 


182  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

framed  and  toned  alike,  and  the  difference  is  not  of 
Nature,  but  of  Degree.  Even  as  it  was  no  chain  of 
inferences  from  the  empty  tomb,  and  the  shattered 
seal,  and  the  guards  become  as  dead  men,  that  led 
to  the  discernment  of  the  Lord's  Resurrection;  nor 
even  the  presentation  and  recognition  of  himself  in 
bodily  form,  —  for  the  Disciples  at  Emmaus,  and 
elsewhere,  knew  him  not,  and  even  Mary  took  him 
for  the  gardener, —  but  rather  the  moral  tones  of 
Jesus,  which  falling  on  the  heart  forced  the  faith 
that  that  heavenly  voice,  which  they  had  believed 
stilled  for  ever  upon  Calvary,  was  once  more  a  liv- 
ing Power,  —  so,  they  are  the  voices  of  God's  spirit, 
toned  by  infinite  tenderness,  that  awaken  the  vibra- 
tions of  our  own,  and  that,  recognized  by  that  por- 
tion of  His  spirit  which  God  has  given  to  each  of 
us,  intimate  a  moral* Presence  and  Power,  within  the 
manifestations  of  whose  Holiness  and  Love  we  live, 
and  move,  and  have  our  being. 

It  must  not  for  a  moment  be  supposed,  however, 
that  the  existence  of  God  is  less  certain  to  us  be- 
cause He  is  spiritually  discerned,  —  not  logically  in- 
ferred ;  —  for  in  fact,  whatever  be  the  instruments 
and  avenues  of  our  knowledge.  Faith  lies  at  the 
foundation  of  them  all,  —  nor  have  we  any  security 
for  the  reality  of  their  communications  except  a 
Moral  Trust.  Man  must  have  faith  in  God  that  his 
sensations,  and  physical  expectations,  do  not  deceive 
him,  to  the  full  as  much  as  he  must  have  trust  that 
the  intimations  of  Conscience,  the  self-sacrificing 
sense  of  Right  and  Justice,  the  spiritual  discernment 
of  the  Perfect,  do  not  lead   him  wrong:  —  and  if 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  183 

God  can  betray  by  the  voices  and  aspirations  of  the 
spiritual  nature,  we  cannot  conceive  what  ground  of 
confidence  any  man  can  have  that  the  impressions 
of  the  Senses,  or  the  deductions  of  the  Intellect,  are 
infallibly  secure.     It  may  be,  as  philosophers  have 
thought,  that  this  beautiful  universe  is  all  an  appear- 
ance, —  that  there  is  no  such  thing,  —  and  that,  like 
the  murderer's  air-drawn  dagger,  it  is  but  a  creation 
of  the  mind.     We  know  no  ground  that  any  man 
has  that  his  senses  are  not  deceiving  him,  but  moral 
trust  in  God.     It  may  be,  if  God  and  his  Goodness 
are  not  to  be  taken  upon  spiritual  Trust,  that  this 
world  of  apparent  order  is  itself  but  a  designed  fal- 
lacy of  the  Senses,  a  contrived  chimera  of  the  In- 
tellect, and  that  at  some  time,  at  Death  for  example, 
we  may  awake  from  this  mocking  Dream  of  Design 
in  an  everlasting  Chaos ;  and  certainly  it  is  a  gross 
inconsistency  for  any  man  to  be  free  from  this  fear, 
who  puts  no  faith  in  the  pure  revelations  of  Con- 
science and  the  Soul.     If  God  can  deceive  upon  one 
set  of  subjects,  or  by  one  set  of  mental  Instruments, 
where  can  be   the   security  that  our  whole   mental 
Being  is  not  a  dreadful  deception  ?     The   most  ir- 
religious of    men  unwittingly  ground  some  of  their 
deepest  convictions,  such  as  the  constancy  of  Nature 
to  her  Laws,  upon  a  religious  foundation,  even  upon 
the    constancy   of   God   to    his    moral    Purposes, — 
upon  Faith  in  the  Truth  and  Holiness  of  the  Author 
of  their  being.  • 

And  when  this  Faith  and  spiritual  sensibility  are 
lively  and  tender,  and  trust  in  the  truth  of  our  facul- 
ties, in  the  religious  intimations  of  our  Nature,  is 


184  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

regarded  as  the  highest  sign  of  a  devout  mind,  how 
numberless  are  the  concm'ring  evidences  of  the  one 
spirit  and  power  of  God,  and,  amid  all  the  diversity 
of  His  operations,  of  one  loved  Design  which  His 
Providence  pursues !  When  the  soul  has  opened 
to  the  filial  faith  that  the  God  who  created  the  hu- 
man spirit  after  His  own  Image  is  also  manifesting 
Himself  to  it  in  his  outward   symbols  of  Creation, 

—  a  harmony  of  moral  design  appears  to  bind  to- 
gether the  influences  of  his  Universe,  —  one  divine 
breath  thrills  through  all  things,  —  as  even  the  small- 
est leaf  has  infinite  connections,  and  feels  the  in- 
fluence of  earth  and  sky,  of  light  and  warmth,  of 
air  and  moisture,  —  and  the  Apostle's  vast  doctrine 
becomes  one  of  our  own  spiritual  discernments, — 
"  that  All  things  are  ours,  whether  the  world,  or 
life,  or  death,  or  things  present  or  things  to  come," 

—  that  All  are  ours,  —  spiritual  ties  which  our  God 
holds  with  us. 

And  it  is  the  Will  of  God  concerning  us,  that  the 
same  unity  of  spirit  which  is  apparent  in  Creation 
should  be  apparent  in  all  the  influences  which  we 
exert,  and  which  are  exerted  upon  us  through  the 
minds  and  characters  of  our  fellow-men.  God  acts 
directly  through  the  spiritual  influences  of  the  ex- 
ternal Creation  ;  —  in  these  He  is  sole  Agent ;  He  has 
chosen  His  own  manner  of  manifestation,  and  is 
undisturbed  by  the  interference  of  man.  Nothing 
is  wanting  but  the  religiotis  sensibility  in  us,  —  the 
discerning  spirit,  —  to  open  up  all  the  communica- 
tions with  God  which,  in  infinite  ways.  His  Works, 
as  the  immediate  expressions  of  his  Mind,  directly 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  185 

convey.     And  the  same  variety  of  divine  manifes- 
tation which  the   outward  Universe    exhibits  is  re- 
peated again  in  the  infinite  diversity  of  the  gifts  and 
influences  of  individual  minds :  —  and  nothing  is  re- 
quired but  the  same  religious  sympathy,  the  divine 
power   of   Charity,   as  an    animating   sentiment   in 
every  heart,  to  impart  a  unity  of  purpose  and  direc- 
tion, a  convergence  to  one  common  end,  to  all  the 
wonderful  variety  of  mental  working,  faculty,  and 
form.     How  gloriously  are  all  the  manifestations  of 
its  Creator  which  external  Nature  sets  forth,  exhib- 
ited afresh  in  the  phenomena  of  Mind  I     The  Sub- 
lime   of   Nature    does    not   equal   the    Sublime    of 
Thought ;  a  good  man  is  a  truer  Image  of  spiritual 
things  than  the  loveliest  landscape;  the  eye  of  de- 
vout Trust  is  more  calm  and  holy  than  the  watch- 
ing stars;  the  light  and  the  compass  of  Genius  is 
brighter  and  vaster  than  sun  or  ocean ;  the  sighing 
of  the  evening  breeze  is  not  so  soft  as  the  human 
whisper,  so  full  of  love  and  mystic  meanings;  and 
the  faithfulness  of  Conscience,  the  inviolable  Law  in 
the  soul,  is  more  worthy  to  picture  the  moral  con- 
stancy of  God,  than  the  orderly  revolutions  of  the 
Heavens.      God    acts    with    as    infinite    a   variety 
through  the  souls  of  Men,  as  he  does  through  the 
forms  of  Nature ;   and  if  the  divine  grace  of  Char- 
ity dwelt  in  us^  the  one  spirit  and  purpose  of  His 
Providence  would  show  itself  in  the  convergence  of 
all  our  individual  gifts  and  powers  to  the  common 
centre    of  the    Universal    Good.      Charity,   then,    is 
that  Sentiment  which  imparts  to  whatever  distin- 
guishes  individuals,   the   same    common    aim   and 

16* 


186  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tendency  that  belong  to  the  Providence  of  God 
itself.  We  have  not  perhaps  an  unspoiled  word  in 
our  language,  that  faithfully  represents  it ;  —  and  we 
cannot  but  think  with  humiliation,  that  if  the  sen- 
timent itself  liad  been  more  common  amongst  us, 
as  the  prime  principle  and  method  in  our  spiritual 
nature,  —  if  our  popular  Religion  had  been  more 
deeply  imbued  with  it,  valued  it  more  justly,  and 
sought  it  more  fervently,  as  the  essential  element  of 
the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  within,  —  the  Charity  of 
Christ  would  have  shone  out  in  our  religious  lan- 
guage above  Faith  and  above  Hope,  as  indeed  their 
source,  the  well-head  of  all  the  living  waters  that 
spring  up  into  everlasting  Life. 

This  "  Charity  "  is  a  sentiment,  or  pervading  ten- 
dency of  the  character,  rather  than  a  particular  af- 
fection. It  is  the  constant  temper  of  the  heart, — 
not  the  warmth  of  individual  attachments.  It  acts 
universally,  and  before  personal  affections  have  time, 
or  opportunity,  to  be  formed.  It  does  not  depend  on 
association,  or  local  connections,  or  the  relations  of 
mutual  interest,  which  create  so  many  of  the  strong- 
est and  most  faithful  bonds  of  earthly  fellowship. 
It  exists  independently  within  the  heart,  and  is  not 
excited  into  life,  as  the  passions  are,  by  the  attrac- 
tions and  solicitations  of  its  objects.  It  acts  at  all 
times,  and  amid  the  most  novel  or  the  most  revolt- 
ing circumstances,  as  truly  as  amid  scenes  most 
familiar,  and  with  beings  most  endeared.  It  is  the 
sympathy  of  the  spirit  with  God,  with  Humanity, 
and  with  Nature.  It  is  the  quick  and  living  senti- 
ment to  which  the  Divine  in  Life  is  never  long  ob- 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  187 

scured,  —  which  keeps  the  spiritual  ear  open  to  the 
still,  small  voice,  and  the  heart,  undimmed  by  self- 
seeking  or  the  soiling  breath  of  sensual  desire,  as  a 
pure  mirror  to  receive  the  images  of  Grace  and 
Truth,  from  the  Spirit  of  Holiness  and  Love  that 
dwells  in  all  things.  It  is  that  spirit  which,  with- 
out effort,  and  by  an  unbidden  impulse,  finds  itself 
in  gentle  communication  with  every  condition  of 
Humanity,  —  to  which  no  joy  of  another's  heart  is 
unnoticed,  no  grief  of  another's  heart  indifferent ;  — 
which  feels  an  involuntary  thankfulness  rising  up 
to  God  for  every  scene  of  human  happiness  it  is 
permitted  to  witness,  —  for  every  evidence  that  the 
world  is  not  so  wretched  as  we  sometimes  deem  it 
to  be,  —  for  the  cheerful  voices  of  labor,  —  for  the 
song  that  shows  the  still  light  and  uncrushed  heart 
of  tasked  poverty,  and  for  the  laughter  of  children 
in  dismal  and  neglected  streets.  It  is  the  spirit  that 
feels  the  bond  of  a  common  nature  with  all  sentient 
things,  —  and  that,  in  fact,  has  acknowledged  that 
bond  in  the  most  emphatic  way,  by  giving  to  a  sym- 
pathy with  the  animal  creation  the  remarkable  name 
oi  humanity.  It  is  a  spirit  which,  when  not  a  natural 
gift  from  God,  it  is  the  last  and  most  perfect  result 
of  the  discipline  of  life,  and  of  the  religious  care  of 
the  character,  to  frame  within  the  heart ;  for  it  is  not 
an  affection  that  can  be  excited  by  its  objects  and 
nurtured  by  outward  warmth,  but  the  very  temper 
and  spirit  of  the  soul  itself,  —  the  mild  and  reconcil- 
ing eye  of  meekness  and  sympathy  that  looks  with 
one  love  on  all  things.  It  is  the  uniting,  reconciling, 
atoning  Power  of  the  moral  and  spiritual  Universe. 


188  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE  CORINTHIANS. 

Intellect  may  give  keenness  of  discernment.  Love 
alone  gives  largeness  to  the  whole  Nature,  some 
share  in  the  comprehensiveness  of  God. 

We  have  attempted  to  describe  a  Sentiment, 
which  it  is  impossible  to  define.  Let  us,  to  show  its 
living  presence,  instance  some  of  the  moments  in 
the  life  of  Christ  when  this  sentiment  of  "  Charity," 
rather  than  an  affection  for  any  particular  beings, 
gave  its  color  and  direction  to  his  thoughts  and 
deeds.  —  When  he  understood  the  Baptist  who  un- 
derstood not  him,  and  chose  a  moment  when  John 
had  given  expression  to  his  distrustful  impatience, 
to  do  full  honor  to  one  so  unlike  himself  in  views, 
methods,  temper,  and  expectations,  —  "Wisdom  is 
justified  of  all  her  children":  —  when  he  passed  out 
of  the  Temple  for  the  last  time,  knowing  it  to  be  the 
last,  —  the  rejected  and  despised, —  and  his  eye  hap- 
pened to  fall  upon  the  widow  and  her  mite,  and  his 
whole  soul  passed  into  hers,  —  and  the  blessing  of 
the  Lord's  rejected  fell  in  fullest  sympathy  upon 
her:  —  when  for  one  short  hour  he  was  the  accepted 
Messiah,  and  with  an  absent  mind  stopped  distract- 
edly on  Olivet,  and  amidst  shouts  of  triumph,  un- 
heard by  him,  was  weeping  for  woes  not  his  own : 
—  when  with  sinking  frame,  and  as  long  as  his 
wasted  strength  could  support  it.  he  bore  his  cross  to 
Golgotha,  —  and  some  hearts  wept  for  him  as  he 
passed  along,  —  and  the  spirit  on  the  freshness  of 
whose  love  no  weariness  had  fallen  seemed  to  lose 
the  sense  of  his  own  position  in  his  intense  sensi- 
bility to  theirs,  —  "  Women  of  Jerusalem,  we'ep  not 
for  me;  weep  for  yourselves  and  for  your  children": 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  189 

—  when,  upon  the  cross,  the  Love  that  never  faileth 
rose  above  the  sense  of  suffering,  and  sustained  it- 
self by  the  suggestion  of  Mercy,  in  the  truth  of 
which,  since  he  urged  it,  let  us  believe,  — "  Father, 
forgive  them,  they  know  not  what  they  do  " ;  —  and, 
as  a  last  instance,  when  he  returned  again  to  Earth, 
and  the  possessor  of  Immortality,  now  God's  ac- 
knowledged and  exalted,  breathed*  unchanged  the 
tenderest  "  charity "  of  human  brotherhood,  and 
singled  out  one  heart  that  had  been  faithless  but 
now  was  anguished,  and  which  the  bitter  shame  of 
recent  desertion  and  treachery  would  have  forbid- 
den to  approach  his  Lord,  —  to  drop  into  that  heart, 
through  special  words  of  remembrance,  the  balm 
of  his  reconciKation  and  forgiveness,  —  Go  tell  my 
disciples,  and  Peter,  that  they  meet  me  in  Galilee." 
Such,  in  living  manifestation,  is  the  Charity  "  which 
thinketh  no  evil,  and  seeketh  not  its  own,  —  which 
rejoiceth  not  in  iniquity,  but  rejoiceth  in  the  truth." 

Respecting  this,  the  inward  Sentiment  of  all 
large  natures,  of  every  peace-making  Life,  the  fol- 
lowing statements  are  made  in  this  celebrated 
Chapter.  That  it  is  the  Soul  of  whatever  is  great 
and  good,  whether  in  intellectual,  or  in  practical 
excellence,  —  without  which  they  either  perish,  or 
by  becoming  spurious  and  self-idolatrous  lose  their 
power  to  bless ;  that  there  are  certain  Character- 
istics, by  which  its  existence  in  any  heart  is  infallibly 
made  known;  and  that  it  is  not  only  of  a  more 
divine  and  immortal  nature  than  any  of  the  intel- 
lectual endowments  of  our  being,  but  is  the  highest* 

*  This,  of  course,  is  true  only  of  that  Love  which  loves  all  that  God 
loves,  and  loves  nothing  that  God  does  not  love. 


190  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

form  of  the  moral  element  in  Man,  and  ranks  first 
among  the  things  of  the  spirit,  above  Faith  and 
above  Hope. 

I.  Let  us  take  the  outward  forms  of  intellectual 
and  practical  excellence  in  the  order  in  which  St. 
Paul  states  them,  and  examine  for  a  moment  their 
spiritual  dependence  upon  Charity.  Suppose  an 
eloquence  without  disinterestedness,  without  sim- 
plicity, without  earnest  sympathy  with  the  wants, 
sufferings,  happiness,  and  improvement  of  Mankind. 
Suppose  a  Demosthenes  without  patriotism,  with  a 
venal  heart.  Suppose  a  Paul  preaching  the  Gospel 
without  divine  Love,  or  Christian  affections  in  him- 
self. What  would  then  be  the  sustaining  spirit  of 
such  Eloquence  ?  Ambition,  the  love  of  power,  self- 
seeking,  ostentatious  vanity.  Every  noble  thought 
would  have  a  base  origin,  —  and  every  generous 
sentiment-be  a  mean  falsehood.  Is  such  the  inspira- 
tion that  gives  to  gifted  speech  dominion  over  the 
souls  of  men?  Or  is  such  the  Eloquence  that  re- 
freshes the  very  heart  from  which  it  came,  by  the 
burning  glow  of  elevated  principles  and  honest  sym- 
pathies? The  most  effective  utterance  is  ever  the 
most  direct,  simple,  earnest,  truthful.  Unrivalled  is 
the  energy  of  persuasion,  that  proceeds  from  the 
tones,  and  looks,  and  kindling  eye  of  unselfish  sin- 
cerity. What  is  Rhetoric,  to  the  simplest  word  of 
Love  and  Truth  !  Only  that  which  comes  from  the 
heart  long  continues  to  go  to  the  heart;  —  and  the 
world  has  not  been  without  examples  of  the  highest 
Eloquence  of  intellectual  genius,  because  suspected 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.  XII.,  XIII.  191 

to  be  unsound  at  heart,  losing  the  faith  of  men,  and 
becoming  as  sounding  brass  or  a  tinkling  cymbal. 

Next,  suppose  intellectual  Eminence,  vast  knowl- 
edge, without  the  bond  of  Charity,  —  unconsecrated 
by  beneficent  connections  with  mankind,  by  coop- 
eration with  God.  Could  the  pride  of  unused,  or 
abused.  Knowledge  sustain,  and  dignify,  and  give  a 
sense  of  satisfaction,  to  that  lonely  mind  ?  Or,  is 
any  thought  more  dreary  and  awful  than  to  pass  a 
life  in  the  study  of  the  truths  and  laws  of  that  In- 
finite Mind,  with  the  spirit  of  whose  Providence 
the  heart  had  no  sympathy,  —  to  live  in  the  cold 
pursuit  of  Infinite  Wisdom  and  Eternal  Order,  and 
have  no  bonds  of  the  affections  with  Him,  —  to  know 
ourselves  gifted  with  such  capacities,  and  gain  by 
them  no  approving  Love,  standing  out  of  spiritual 
harmony  with  Earth  and  Heaven  ? 

Once  more,  suppose  the  outward  semblance,  and 
actions,  of  practical  excellence,  without  its  inward 
truth,  —  almsgiving  without  charity,  —  prayers  with- 
out devotion,  —  fastings  without  humiliation  of  heart, 
—  the  martyr's  stake  without  the  martyr's  trust  in 
Truth.  Does  this  do  good  to  any  one,  or  deceive 
any  one  ?  It  cannot  imitate  even  the  outward  mien 
of  goodness.  The  false  spirit  works  out  through  it, 
and  betrays  it.  The  heart  is  false,  and  perishing 
before  God.  Of  such  semblance  we  can  only  say, 
in  the  words  of  St.  Paul,  —  "  It  is  nothings  and  it 
profiteth  nothing." 

II.  There  are  unfailing  *'  signs,"  by  which  it  is 
manifested  whether  this  Sentiment  of  Charity  is  the 


192  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

spirit  of  the  Character.  The  tree  is  known  by  its 
fruits.  The  religious  and  the  moral  character,  though 
they  bear  infinite  variety  of  fruit,  have  but  one 
root ;  —  this  holy  love,  this  divine  sympathy  with 
goodness  and  happiness,  and  the  desire  to  reproduce 
them,  —  this  harmony  with  the  merciful  tendencies 
of  Providence  carried  into  all  things,  —  and  all  the 
virtues  of  the  Christian  Life,  active  and  passive,  are 
the  flower,  and  bloom,  of  this  one  Spirit.  Then,  the 
Spirit  of  Love  must  work  the  works,  and  speak  the 
tones  of  Love.  It  cannot  exist  and  give  no  sign,  or 
a  false  sign.  It  cannot  be  a  spirit  of  Love,  and 
mantle  into  irritable  and  selfish  impatience.  It 
cannot  be  a  spirit  of  Love,  and  at  the  same  time 
make  Self  the  prominent  object.  It  cannot  rejoice 
to  lend  itself  to  the  happiness  of  others,  and  at  the 
same  time  be  seeking  its  own.  It  cannot  be  gener- 
ous, and  envious.  It  cannot  be  sympathizing,  and 
unseemly ;  self-forgetful,  and  vainglorious.  It  can- 
not delight  in  the  rectitude  and  purity  of  other 
hearts,  as  the  spiritual  elements  of  their  peace,  and 
yet  unnecessarily  suspect  them.  Love  taketh  up 
no  malign  elements  ;  —  such  are  not  its  natural  affin- 
ities, —  its  spirit  prompteth  it,  to  cover  in  mercy  all 
things  that  ought  not  to  be  exposed,  —  to  believe  all 
of  good  that  can  be  believed, — to  hope  all  things 
that  a  good  God  makes  possible,  —  and  to  endure  all 
things,  that  the  hope  may  be  made  good.  It  is  not 
that  Charity  is  slower  to  recognize  actual  evil  than 
Malignity  itself,  —  but  that  it  is  quicker  to  see  good. 
The  purest  spirit  must  ever  have  the  finest  sensibil- 
ity to  the  presence  of  evil,  ^—  but  it  suggests  it  not. 


I.  COR.  CHAPS.  XII.,  XIII.  193 

and  it  loves  not  to  linger  with  it,  or  to  dwell  upon 
it; — "  Whatsoever  things  are  true,  holy,  just,  pure, 
lovely,  — it  thinks  on  these  things. " 

III.  The  Intellectual  distinctions  and  graces  of 
our  Being  are  relative  and  temporary.*  It  may  be 
that  the  very  Faculties  by  which  our  present  knowl- 
edge is  attained  are  only  adapted*  to  the  present 
condition  of  man,  and  are  of  a  perishable  essence ;  — 
but  in  all  ages,  and  in  all  worlds,  the  spirit  of  sym- 
pathy with  the  pure  and  good  must  be  of  the  sub- 
stance of  our  peace,  our  principle  of  harmony  with 
the  will  and  the  works  of  God.  Charity  never  fail- 
eth :  Love,  the  very  same  Love  that  we  experience 
now,  can  be  superseded  in  no  world  w^here  God  and 
blessed  Beings  are.  Knowledge  may  fade,  like  a 
star  out  of  the  meridian  sky,  as  a  light  unsuited  to 
that  diviner  Day.  What  vast  stores  of  Knowledge 
prized  on  Earth  shall  find  no  scope  in  Heaven  !  The 
erudition  of  the  Critic,  the  learning  of  the  Biblical 
Student,  —  a  few  words  of  actual  converse  with  the 
Church  of  the  first-born,  with  Prophets  and  Apos- 
tles, will  sweep  it  all  away,  —  if  there  indeed  its 
doubts  and  questions  have  any  significance  at  all. 
The  profound  knowledge  of  Law  which  a  lifetime 
has  acquired,  —  the  science  of  Disease  to  which 
only  the  finest  discernment  and  the  most  unwearied 
patience  can  attain,  —  the  theory  and  practice  of  the 

*  A  distinguished  philosopher,  Dr.  Thomas  Brown,  has  suggested 
that  a  greater  keenness  of  Sight  might  make  visible  the  constituent 
elements  of  all  bodies,  and  so  render  unnecessary  the  analysis  of  Chem- 
istry. 

17 


194  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

common  arts  of  Life ;  —  these  can  have  no  applica- 
tion to  a  world  spiritual  in  its  framework,  and  not 
subject  to  want  or  death.  The  Powers  that  have 
been  exercised  and  trained  therein  may,  indeed,  be 
nobler  instruments  for  eternal  progress,  —  but  this 
Knowledge  is  for  the  Earth,  and  the  Immortal  Fac- 
ulties may  cast  its  burden  off.  Our  partial  knowl- 
edge of  God,  and  of  divine  things,  may  have  to  be 
utterly  transformed  in  that  perfect  state  whose  full 
Light  is  attended  by  no  shadows,  nor  manifested 
under  the  conditions,  which  possibly  a  state  of  Dis- 
cipline may  here  impose.  As  the  guesses  and  fan- 
cies of  a  child  are  to  the  insight  of  a  man,  may  be  the 
relation  of  the  Earthly  to  the  Spiritual  Mind.  Here 
we  see  as  through  a  glass,  catching  reflections  and 
hints.  This  material  universe  is  often  a  veil  over 
God's  Presence,  —  a  hiding  of  His  power.  In  this 
state,  then,  our  knowledge  of  Divine  things  has  no 
analogy  to  God's  knowledge :  but  we  love  as  God 
loves ;  the  moral  affection  is  the  same  in  essence. 

And  even  of  the  imperishable  directions  of  the 
Spirit,  Love  is  the  only  one  that  is  common  to  us 
with  God  ;  —  it  is  the  only  element  in  which  we  are 
partakers  of  the  Divine  Nature.  Faith  must  be  for 
Man  eternal ;  —  never  can  confidence  in  God  be 
dispensed  with,  and  Heaven  shall  fully  establish  the 
childlike  Trust ;  —  but  God  has  no  part  in  this  sen- 
timent,—  the  Faith  of  the  everlasting  Father  can- 
not be  tried.  Hope  can  never  die  out  of  the  death- 
less Soul ;  for  ever  must  a  noble  and  blessed  being, 
a  child  of  the  Infinite,  aspire  to  higher  perfection, 
and  reach  forth  to  things  before  ;  —  yet  Hope  is  not 


I.    COR.    CHAPS.  XII.,    XIII.  195 

for  God,  —  He  knows  not  the  sentiment,  —  it  belongs 
not  to  the  Perfect  One,  the  Blessed  for  Ever.  But 
Love  is  God's  as  ours  ;  and^t  is  ours  only  because  it 
is  God's ;  and  out  of  it  spring  our  Hope  and  Faith. 
Love  is  the  very  essence  of  the  Eternal's  Blessed- 
ness, —  the  moral  Spirit  of  the  Divine  Nature.  Love 
is  therefore  the  highest  part  in  Man;  —  the  source 
of  whatever  is  divine  in  us; — our  only  fellowship 
with  the  Father,  —  our  sole  Salvation,  and  fitness 
for  the  inheritance  of  the  Saints  in  Light.  This  is 
not  for  a  moment  to  exalt  Love  above  Holiness,  — 
for  we  speak  not  of  the  Love  of  the  Heart  only, 
but  also  of  the  Love  of  the  Soul,  the  Mind,  the 
Strength,  and  so  Love  cannot  remain  inviolate,  Self 
cannot  be  extinguished,  except  in  a  holy  being. 

Now  abide  for  ever  Faith,  Hope  Charity, — these 
three,  —  but  the  greatest  of  these  is  Charity. 


196  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION  III. 

LOVE  GIVES  PRECEDENCE  TO  THE  GIFTS  THAT  EDIFY  ;  AND 
OBTRUDES  NOT  ON  THE  CHURCH  WHAT  IS  PERSONAL  TO 
THE  INDIVIDUAL  SPIRIT,  PRIVATE  TO  ITSELF  AND  TO  GOD. 
PROPHECY. TONGUES. RULES  OF  ORDER. 


CHAP.  XIV.  1-40. 


1  Follow  after  love,  and  be  zealous  of  spiritual  things, 

2  and  chiefly  that  ye  may  prophesy.  For  he  that  speaketh 
in  a  tongue  speaketh  not  to  men,  but  to  God,  for  no  one 

3  hearkeneth,  and  in  spirit  he  speaketh  mysteries.  But  he 
that  prophesieth  speaketh  to  men,  edification  and  exhorta- 

4  tion  and  consolation.    He  that  speaketh  in  a  tongue  edifi- 

5  eth  himself;  but  he  that  prophesieth  edifies  the  Church.  I 
wish  indeed  you  all  to  speak  in  tongues,  but  rather  that  ye 
prophesied,  for  greater  is  he  that  prophesieth  than  he  that 
speaketh  in  tongues,  unless  that  he  interpret,  so  that  the 

6  Church  may  receive  edification.  Now,  brethren,  if  I  come 
to  you  speaking  in  tongues,  what  shall  I  profit  you,  unless 
I  shall  speak  to  you,  either  in  revelation,  or  in  knowledge, 

7  or  in  prophecy,  or  in  doctrine  ?  So  things  without  life, 
giving  sound,  whether  pipe  or  harp,  unless  they  give  a 
distinction  to  the  sounds,  how  shall  it  be  known  what  is 

8  piped  or  harped  ?     And  if  the  trumpet  give  an  uncertain 

9  sound,^  who  shall  prepare  himself  for  the  battle  ?  So  also, 
unless  ye  utter  by  the  tongue  well-marked  speech,  how 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  197 

shall  it  be  known  what  is  spoken  ?     For  ye  shall  be  speak- 

10  ing  to  the  air.  There  are,  it  may  be,  so  many  kinds  of 
voices  in  the  world,  and  none  of  them  without  expression. 

11  If  then  I  know  not  the  meaning  of  the  voice,  I  shall  be 
to  him  that  is  speaking  a  barbarian,  and  he  that  is  speak- 

12  ing  shall  be  a  barbarian  to  me.  So  also  ye,  when  ye  are 
zealous  of  spirits,  seek  that  ye  may  abound  to  the  edify- 

13  ing  of  the  Church.    Wherefore  let  him  that  speaketh  in  a 

14  tongue  pray  that  he  may  interpret.  For  if  I  pray  in  a 
tongue,  my  spirit  prays,  but  my  understanding  is  without 

15  fruit.  What  then  ?  I  will  pray  with  the  spirit,  and  I  will 
pray  with  the  understanding  also ;  I  will  sing  with  the 

16  spirit,  and  I  will  sing  with  the  understanding  also.  Be- 
cause, when  thou  shalt  bless  with  the  spirit,  how  shall  he 
that  occupieth  the  place  of  the  ignorant  say  Amen  to  thy 
thanksgiving  ;  seeing  that  he  knows  not  what  thou  sayest  ? 

17  For  thou  indeed  givest  thanks  well ;  but  the  other  is  not 

18  edified.     I  thank  my  God  speaking  in  Tongues  more  than 

19  ye  all :  but  in  the  Church  I  choose  to  speak  five  words 
by    my    understanding,   that    I    may  teach   others  also, 

20  rather  than  ten  thousand  words  in  a  tongue.  Brethren, 
become    not   children  in  understanding :    but  in  evil  be 

21  ye  children,  and  in  understanding  be  ye  men.  In  the 
Law  it  is  written,  "  In  other  tongues,  and  with  other 
lips,   shall  I  speak  to  this  people,  yet  neither  then  will 

22  they  hearken  to  me,  saith  the  Lord.  "    So  that  tongues  are 
■    for  a  sign,  not  to  those  who  believe,  but  to  the  unbeliev- 
ing :  but  prophesying,  not  for  the  unbelievers,  but  for  the 

23  believing.  If  then  the  whole  Church  be  come  together 
in  one  place,  and  all  speak  in  tongues,  and  the  ignorant 
or  unbelieving  come  in,  will  they  not  say  that  ye  are  mad  ? 

24  But  if  all  prophesy,  and  an  unbeliever,  or  one  ignorant, 
come  in,  he  is  convinced  by  all ;  he  is  searched  through 

25  by  all ;  the  secrets  of  his  heart  are  made  manifest ;  and 

17* 


198 


FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SO,  falling  on  his  face,  he  will  worship  God,  declaring  that 

26  God  of  a  truth  is  in  you.  How  then  is  it,  brethren  ? 
When  ye  come  together,  each  of  you  hath  a  psalm,  hath 
a  doctrine,  hath  a  tongue,  hath  a  revelation,  hath  an  inter- 

27  pretation.  Let  all  be  done  to  edification.  If  any  speak 
in  a  tongue,  let  it  be  by  two,  or  at  most  by  three,  and  in 

28  succession  ;  and  let  one  interpret.  And  if  there  be  no  in- 
terpreter, let  him  keep  silence  in  the  Church,  and  speak 

29  to  himself  and  to  God.     And  let  two  or  three  prophets 

30  speak,  and  let  others  discern.     And  if,  to  another  who  is 

31  sitting,  a  revelation  be  given,  let  the  first  be  silent.  For 
ye  can  all  prophesy,  one  by  one ;  that  all  may  learn,  and 

32  that  all  may  be  comforted.     And  the  sprrits  of  prophets 

33  are  subject  to  prophets.     For  God  is  not  the  maker  of 

34  confusion,  but  of  peace.  So,  in  all  churches  of  the  saints, 
let  your  women  be  silent  in  the  churches,  for  it  hath  not 
been  permitted  to  them  to  speak,  but  to  be  subordinate, 

35  as  also  the  Law  saith.  And  if  they  wish  to  learn  any 
thing,  let  them  ask  their  husbands  at  home,  for  it  is  dis- 
graceful for  women  to  speak  in  the  Church. 

36  Did  the  word  of  God  proceed  from  you  ?     Or  did  it 

37  come  to  you  alone  ?  If  any  one  seem  to  be  a  prophet,  or 
spiritual,  let  him  acknowledge  the  things  that  I  write  to 

38  you,  that  they  are  the  commandments  of  the  Lord.     But 

39  if  any  one  is  ignorant,  let  him  be  ignorant.  Wherefore, 
brethren,  be  zealous  of  prophecy,  and  forbid  not  to  speak 

40  with  tongues.  But  let  all  things  be  done  decently,  and  in 
order. 


The  twelfth,  thirteenth,  and  fourteenth  chapters  of 
this  Epistle  form  a  connected  Argument,  and  should 
be   embraced  in   one   view.     The   eminent  beauty, 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  199 

and  practical  importance,  of  the  celebrated  descrip- 
tion of  Love,  has  given  to  the  thirteenth  chapter  an 
independent  interest  which  has  loosened  its  place  in 
the  Apostle's  reasoning.  The  temporary  circum- 
stances of  Corinthian  contentions  are  forgotten, — 
and  the  special  application  of  the  divine  principle 
of  Christian  sympathy  is  obscured  by  the  sense  of 
its  still  abiding  truth  and  power.  So  that,  even  in 
this  respect,  it  has  come  to  pass,  that  "  the  tongues 
have  ceased, "  and  "  the  prophecies  have  come  to  an 
end,"  and  the  questions  about  "knowledge  have 
vanished  away,"  —  and  to  the  eye  of  the  Christian 
reader,  that  part  of  the  record  which  relates  to  the 
Corinthian  pretensions  is  dimly  marked,  and  only 
"  the  Charity  that  never  faileth  "  shines  forth  from 
out  the  page. 

It  becomes  necessary,  therefore,  having  paid  our 
separate  tribute  to  the  universal  and  everlasting  in- 
terest of  that  divine  Sentiment,  that  we  should  now 
exhibit,  in  a  more  exegetical  spirit,  its  particular  con- 
nections with  that  portion  of  the  Epistle  into  which 
it  is  introduced. 

We  must,  again  and  again,  call  upon  ourselves 
for  a  certain  effort  of  the  Imagination,  to  bring  be- 
fore us  the  real  condition  of  the  primitive  Churches, 
—  and  on  this  historic  point,  as  much  as  with  ref- 
erence to  any  scientific  pursuit,  it  is  necessary  to 
say,  that  the  only  preparation  for  the  reception  of 
Truth  is  the  dismissal  of  all  such  crude  and  hastily 
adopted  notions  as  may  tend  to  preoccupy  or  mis- 
lead.      As   an   eminent    modern    Philosopher*   has 

•  Sir  John  Herschel. 


200  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

beautifully  said,  upon  all  subjects  such  an  effort  "is 
the  *  euphrasy  and  rue '  with  which  we  must  *  purge 
our  Sight '  before  we  can  receive  and  contemplate, 
as  they  are,  the  lineaments  of  Truth  and  Nature." 
And  we  are  especially  liable,  from  feelings  akin  to 
veneration,  to  misconceive  the  actual  condition  of 
the  Early  Churches.  In  the  absence  of  distinct 
historical  knowledge,  which  indeed  does  not  exist, 
and  must  be  collected  from  hints  and  incidental 
notices,  a  religious  sentiment  of  what  would  be 
natural  to  such  a  season,  of  what  would  harmonize 
with  our  own  ideal  conceptions  of  the  men  and  the 
manners  that  ought  to  have  been  produced  by  such 
a  rending  of  the  Heavens,  and  such  an  outpouring 
of  divine  influences  from  God,  covers  with  a  solemn 
haze  that  holy  Time,  and  peoples  it  with  the  mys- 
tic forms  of  spiritual  and  unearthly  men, — just  as 
Palestine  itself,  to  many  a  mind,  appears  not  to  have 
belonged  to  this  common  earth,  but  to  be  a  Shadow 
Land  where  spirits  walked,  and  the  Angel's  wing 
might  be  daily  seen  amid  the  haunts  of  men.  Our 
religious  feeling  of  the  sacredness  and  elevation  of 
heart  that  must  needs  characterize  Apostolic  men, 
and  of  the  lofty  element  of  piety  and  love,  above 
the  agitation  and  disturbance  of  the  lower  passions 
and  meaner  thwartings  of  Life,  in  which  we  suppose 
them  to  have  habitually  breathed,  —  is  transferred 
also  to  the  Apostolic  Churches ;  —  and  notwith- 
standing very  significant  hints  to  the  contrary,  the 
historic  picture  of  strife  and  spiritual  pretension  — 
alas!  of  common  humanity  —  is  too  dim  to  rob 
us  of  the  fairer  vision  of  simplicity,  self-surrender, 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  201 

• 

heavenly-mindedness,  and  superiority  to  all  minor 
things,  which  we  naturally  ascribe  to  the  Primitive 
Christianity.  I  know  nothing  more  painful  than  to 
have  one's  heart  disenchanted  of  such  a  picture ;  and 
there  is  no  task  one  less  willingly  undertakes,  than 
to  make  such  a  "benignant  vision  fade  away,  whilst 
the  cold,  hard  features  of  the  Reality  are  gradually 
exposed.  A  man  who  reveres  his  nature,  and  be- 
lieves that  all  that  was  ever  imaged  of  its  Purity 
and  Love  might  well  be  nothing  short  of  true,  will 
not  exhibit  an  inhuman  eagerness  to  dissolve  any 
fair  and  blessed  belief  in  a  realized  sacredness  and 
peacje,  which,  though  it  belongs  to  the  Past,  and 
claims  no  place  in  the  Present,  still  shows,  by  the  fa- 
cility with  which  it  is  received,  the  Faith  of  the 
common  heart  in  the  divine  affections  of  humanity. 
But  perhaps  even  the  tenderest  sympathy  with  Man 
should  disincline  us  to  favor  that  tendency,  which 
only  shows  our  instinctive  faith  in  Goodness,  whilst 
it  transfers  its  energy  to  some  distant  scene  of  Ac- 
tion ;  and  whilst  it  finds,  or  creates,  but  little  that  is 
divine  in  the  Present,  satisfies  and*  expends  the  ideal 
sentiment  that  is  in  us,  by  dwelling  on  a  transfig- 
ured Past,  and  a  celestial  Future.  Every  man  has  a 
Belief  in  the  .capabilities  of  Humanity  to  realize  a 
life  of  peace  and  sacredness;  but,  alas!  Eden  or 
Heaven,  or  some  mythic  and  unhistoric  period,  is 
always  the  scene  of  the  Picture ;  —  whilst  it  is  for- 
gotten that  such  a  Faith  presses  with  the  whole  of 
its  practical  responsibility  on  the  present  hour  of 
Life,  —  and  that  whoever  believes  in  a  blessed  capa- 
bility which  he  does  not  aim  to  manifest,  is  a  spirit 


202  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

fallen  and  unprofitable  in  the  eyes  of  God.     Assur- 
edly God  gave  us  our  Belief  of  a  fairer  and  nobler 
state  for  Man,  —  a  Belief  universal  to  every  form  of 
the  religious,  or  the  irreligious  Mind,  —  not  that  un- 
tasked  Fancy  should  locate  it  in  the  Past,  or  dream- 
ing Hope  transfer  it  to  the  Skies,  but  that  with  our 
own  hearts  and  hands,  with  the  energy  and  patience 
of  true  Believers,  we  should  transfigure  the  Present, 
build  up  the  living  Temple,  and  realize  outwardly 
the  spiritual  Beings  that  we  are.      This,  essentially 
religious,   Faith   has   been    delivered   over  to   be    a 
luxury  to  the  Imagination,  —  whilst  the  Conscience 
has  scarcely  felt  the  burden  of  its  Greatness.     Trust 
in  our  diviner  capacities,  and  in  a  more  blessed  state 
for  Man,  has   sought   its  justification  in  uncertain 
traditions  of  the  Past  and  dim  visions  of  the  Future, 
whilst  for  the  Present  it  assumes  humble  dejection, 
and  self-distrust,  and  the  miserable  confessions  of  in- 
firmity, as  the  religious  attitudes  of  this  Christian 
Faith.    Now  this  is  in  reality  to  burlesque  Humility, 
—  for  it  is  not  only  to  distrust  one's  self,  but  to  dis- 
trust God,  —  it  is  not  only  to  have  no  confidence  in 
our  own  strength,  but  to  have  no  confidence  in  Him 
who  perfects  His  strength  in  the  weakness  of  those 
who   cast  themselves   in    Faith   upon   Him.     God 
loves  not  the  Humility  that  is  as  distrustful  of  Him 
as  of  itself;   and  he  is   the   meekest  child   of  the 
Heavenly  Father,  who,  knowing  his  own  weakness, 
has  yet  a  divine  Faith,  that,  if  he  aspires  to  be  true 
to  his  holier  nature,  the  everlasting  Grace  will  bear 
him   through.     To   be   humble   and   self-abased   is 
nothing,  —  but  to  be  humble  and  at  the  same  time 


I.    COR.   CHAP.    XIV.  203 

to  lift  the  eyes  and  stretch  forth  the  hands  towards 
heights  of  Heavenly  Goodness,  and  regard  them  as 
attainable  through  reliance  upon  Him  who,  within 
the  sincere  and  pure  heart,  works  effectually  to  will 
and  to  do  of  his  own  good  pleasure,  —  this  is  the 
true  meekness  of  a  Christian  Soul.  Wherever  there 
is  Christian  Faith  there  must  also  be  something  of 
the  spirit  of  Christian  Enterprise,  and  that  from  no 
mere  confidence  in  man,  but  from  filial  trust  that 
God  never  deserts  those  who  follow,  in  love  and  self- 
forgetfulness,  the  highest  guidings  of  His  Spirit. 
Who  ever  did  so  much  to  create  Faith  in  the  divine 
powers  of  Human  Nature,  as  Jesus  Christ?  Yet 
who  ever  so  entirely  cast  himself  upon  God  for 
strength?  In  him  were  united  Humility,  and  the 
feeling  that  all  things  were  possible  to  him.  Never 
do  we  read  of  a  moment  of  depression,  but  it  is 
followed  by  the  record,  that  a  fresh  sense  of  con- 
nection with  God  came  upon  him,  —  that  he  re- 
joiced in  Spirit,  —  and  that  the  eye  which  Prayer 
had  brightened,  or  any  symptom  of  success  kin- 
dled into  hope,  "  saw  Satan  like  lightning  fall  from 
Heaven."  —  Now,  perhaps,  the  feeling  that  the  prim- 
itive Church  caught  and  continued  this  spirit  of  our 
Master,  has  rather  directed  us  to  the  Past  for  the 
realizations  of  Christianity  as  a  thing  once  accom- 
plished, than  created  the  sentiment  of  Responsibility, 
that  its  realizations  are  still  for  us  to  accomplish,  — 
and  that  the  justification,  which  in  fact  no  past  con- 
dition of  the  Church  has  yet  given,  of  the  divine 
Faith  in  Humanity  which  Jesus  taught,  it  is  still 
for  us  to  give.     And  if  this  be  so,  then  have  we  less 


204  I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV. 

scruple  in  presenting  that  Apostolic  Age  in  its  own 
colors ;  if  to  do  so  may  create  the  sentiment  that 
Christian  Enterprise,  in  order  to  justify  by  out  own 
realizations  the  divine  trust  and  spirit  of  the  Lord, 
has  still  to  show,  what  as  yet  the  world  has  never 
seen,  the  due  fruits  of  such  a  faith.  It  is  in  this 
spirit,  —  to  do  away  with  the  enervated  impressions 
that  there  ever  was  a  realized  Church  of  God  from 
which  the  world  has  deteriorated,  —  and  to  show 
that  on  every  new  generation  of  advancing  Man 
rests  the  responsibility  of  consummating  the  faith  and 
divine  expectations  of  the  Lord,  —  that  we  would 
now  speak  the  plain  and  unvarnished  Truth  of  that 
Apostolical  Period. 

There  never  was  a  time  when  the  Community  of 
Believers,  by  their  realizations  of  brotherly  Love, 
and  their  communion  with  the  Holy  Spirit,  approxi- 
mated to  the  Saviour's  idea  of  a  Kingdom  of  God 
upon  Earth.  That  the  influence  of  a  new  and 
more  quickening  spirit  in  Religion,  which  brought 
the  living  heart  into  immediate  connection  with 
God,  wrought  powerfully  upon  individual  minds,  and 
produced  results  that  can  only  be  attributed  to  a  di- 
vine movement  of  the  mightiest  elements  in  Man, 
is,  in  our  view,  an  established  Fact.  But  we  can 
nowhere  find,  either  in  the  small  community  that  as- 
sembled around  the  Lord,  or  in  the  Apostolic  period, 
or  in  the  times  of  the  early  Fathers  of  the  Church, 
any  traces  of  a  Society  in  which  the  mind  of  Christ 
subdued  the  infirmities  of  man  and  the  passions  of 
the  world.  And  the  more  we  look  into  the  details 
of  these  times  with  a  calm  and  quiet  eye,  when  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  205 

prejudice  of  sacred  expectation  has  yielded  to  an 
investigation  into  the  Facts,  —  the  more  we  are  dis- 
appointed and  startled  to  find  how  often  the  lowest 
elements  in  man  dwelt  in  close  proximity  with 
Christian  influences,  and  appropriated  the  privileges 
of  Faith  for  the  mean  indulgences  of  a  common, 
vain,  worldly,  and  unregenerated  heart.  We  would 
not  imply  that  Insincerity  was  at  the  root  of  these 
evils,  for  there  is  no  question  so  difficult  to  determine 
as  the  degree  in  which  spiritual  self-deception  may 
connect  itself  with  the  lower  passions  of  the  mind ; 
and  when  made  the  grounds  of  social  elevation  and 
distinction.  Religion  has  always  manifested  a  pecu- 
liar tendency  to  part  with  its  diviner  spirit,  and  to 
give  intensity  to  the  fanatical  selfishness  of  man. 
We  might  suppose  that,  if  anywhere  in  the  primitive 
times,  around  the  person  of  the  Lord,  a  Christian 
Society,  a  Church  of  God,  would  be  formed :  but  of 
the  Twelve,  we  have  it  on  record,  that  James  and 
John  desired  spiritual  dominion  over  their  Brethren, 
and  sought  to  turn  the  love  that  the  Lord  bore  them 
to  their  own  glory ;  —  that  Peter  was  carnal  in  view, 
and  savored  not  of  the  things  that  be  of  God,  and, 
as  might  be  expected,  without  spiritual  self-knowl- 
edge and  thoughtfulness,  was  unstable  and  faithless 
in  trial;  —  that  Thomas  could  not  recognize  the  di- 
vine mind  in  Christ,  and  put  the  material  question, 
"  Show  us  the  Father,"  and  was  obtusely  sceptical, 
as  such  a  man  naturally  would  be,  of  his  Resurrec- 
tion from  the  dead; — that  Iscariot  embittered  the 
heart  of  Jesus,  and  introduced  a  sense  of  painful 
discord  into  his  last  and  parting  hours,  —  "I  have 

18 


206         FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

chosen  you  twelve,  and  one  of  you  is  a  Traitor,"  — 
"  He  that  eateth  bread  with  me  hath  lifted  up  his 
heel  against  me  "  ;  —  and  that  of  the  rest,  though  so 
distinguished  in  privilege  and  place,  nothing  but 
their  names  is  known  to  preserve  their  existence  from 
oblivion.  And  neither  in  this  respect  was  the  dis- 
ciple above  his  Master;  —  a  Church  of  Christ  did 
not  gather  around  the  Apostles  more  rapidly  than 
around  their  Lord.  We  read,  indeed,  of  one  period 
when  the  multitude  of  those  who  believed  were  of 
one  heart  and  of  one  mind,  and  great  grace  was 
upon  them  all;  —  but  the  next  passage  records  the 
judicial  death  of  two  of  their  number  who  desired 
to  combine  the  semblance  of  Christian  Communion 
with  reservation  and  falsehood  of  heart;  —  and  when 
we  look  further,  we  find  these  first  believers,  with  an 
exclusive  nationality,  ignorant  of  the  Liberty  of  the 
Gospel,  and  looking  coldly  on  the  evangelizing  spirit 
of  St.  Paul.  St.  Paul's  enumeration  of  the  qualities 
that  should  be  found  in  a  Bishop  of  the  Church, 
might  give  us  some  insight  into  the  nature  of  the 
materials  on  which  Christianity  spent  its  first  influ- 
ences, and  the  impossibility  that  a  Kingdom  of  God 
on  Earth  should  be  the  immediate  fruit.  "  A  Bishop 
must  be  blameless,  vigilant,  sober,  of  good  behavior, 
—  not  given  to  wine,  no  striker,  not  greedy  of  filthy 
lucre,  —  not  a  brawler,  —  not  covetous,  —  not  a  nov- 
ice, lest  being  lifted  up  with  pride  he  fall  into  the 
condemnation  of  the  Devil."  Siuch  a  passage,  to 
those  not  voluntarily  under  the  influence  of  religious 
enthusiasm,  is  full  of  information  as  to  the  slow  and 
natural  workings  of  the  Spirit  of  the  Gospel,  —  and 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  207 

pictures  but  too  plainly  the  coarse  and  common  na- 
tures, with  which,  even  in  its  highest  offices,  the 
Church  had  to  contend. 

The  Image  conveyed  to  us  by  this  First  Epistle 
to  the  Corinthians,  is  that  of  a  Community  in  which 
the  first  stirrings  of  a  higher  life  combined  with  the 
unsubjugated  passions  of  common  men, —  and  the 
personal  distinctions  conferred  for  the  Gospel's  sake, 
instead  of  tending  to  the  destruction  of  the  ambition, 
spiritual  pride,  and  vainglory  of  our  lower  nature, 
were  rather  seized  upon  as  especial  instruments  for 
their  gratification.  The  various  gifts  of  God's  Spirit 
are  disposed  in  rival  attitudes,  and  discussed  in  their 
relations  to  the  glory  of  the  individual.  Paul  can- 
not plant,  and  ApoUos  cannot  water,  whilst  the 
Debate  rages  as  to  their  spiritual  Leadership,  —  and 
the  factious  Church  perishes.  The  Teacher^  whose 
mental  gifts  qualified  him  to  present  in  clear  and 
systematic  view  the  connected  Truths  of  Religion, 
is  at  strife  for  precedence  with  the  Prophet^  whose 
more  inspired  utterance  kindled  into  intense  life  the 
spiritual  elements  in  man,  and  carried  away  captive 
the  Conscience  and  the  Heart ;  whilst  the  rapt  Mys- 
tic who  spoke  in  Tongues^  and  addressed  God  in 
ecstatic  words,  or  in  the  inarticulate  cries  and  sigh- 
ings  of  an  excited  spirit,  which,  though  expressive  of 
real  states  of  inward  feeling,  were  unintelligible  and 
uninstructive  to  the  Church,  would  naturally  act 
most  powerfully  on  the  weak  and  morbid  forms  of 
religious  temperament,  and  be  ranked  accordingly,  by 
those  who  required  a  spiritual  excitement  of  this 
mixed  nature.     Now  in  this  picture  we  see  a  real 


208  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Power,  the  first  influence  of  Christian  Truth,  acting 
naturally  on  the  common   elements  of  our  nature; 

—  and  if  we  deem  it  strange  and  disappointing  that 
such  should  have  been  the  first  condition  of  the 
Church,  it  is  because  we  contemplate  it  under  the 
false  apprehension  that  not  only  was  the  Christian 
influence  supernaturally  given,  but  also  that  its  prac- 
tical operation  was  supernaturally  conducted  on  the 
Community  of  the  first  Believers.  For  this  apprehen- 
sion there  is  not  a  shadow  of  support,  —  and  we  must 
regard  its  prevalence  as  a  sign  of  that  moral  weak- 
ness in  man  which  inclines  him  rather  to  direct  his 
gaze  to  some  distant  scene  for  the  consummations 
of  Christian  excellence,  than  to  feel  on  Conscience  a 
personal  responsibility  to  manifest  that  Perfection  in 
his  own  circumstances,  —  than  to  feel  that  to  himself, 
to  every  true  lover  of  our  Saviour,  it  is  confided,  as 
a  sacred  trust,  to  justify  by  his  own  realizations  a 
Kingdom  of  Heaven  upon  Earth,  and  the  long  pre- 
dicted Ages  of  our  Lord. 

In  the  twelfth  Chapter,  St.  Paul  exhibits  the 
variety  of  individual  endowment  as  designed  to 
contribute  to  the  complete  edification  of  the  Church; 

—  for  which  if  we  seek  an  illustration,  we  have  the 
common  parallel  of  the  division  of  employment  and 
ofiice  contributing  to  the  perfection  of  mechanical 
Art.  In  the  thirteenth  Chapter,  he  shows  that  amid 
this  mental  diversity  moral  unity  must  be  obtained 
by  Love,  which  is  itself  the  divinest  grace  of  God, 
combining  with  aU  other  endowments,  and  giving 
them  their  direction  to  the  common  good.  And  in  the 
fourteenth  Chapter,  he  states  that,  in  harmony  with 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  209 

this  preeminence  of  Love,  the  highest  value  attached 
to  those  spiritual  gifts  by  which  the  Church  might 
be  edified,  exhorted,  or  consoled,  —  whilst  all  the 
more  enthusiastic  manifestations  of  spiritual  feeling, 
and  rapt  utterances  of  piety,  were  not  for  the  public 
Assembly,  but  for  the  private  Devotions  of  the 
Closet  and  the  Heart. 

"We   had    before    occasion    to    observe    that   the 
common   interpretation,  which   makes    speaking  in 
Tongues  equivalent  to  the  power  of  using  Foreign 
Languages,  cannot  be  reconciled  with  this  Chapter. 
As  a  single  proof,  take  the  fifth  verse  :  —  "I  would, 
indeed,  that  ye  all  spake  in  tongues,  but  rather  that 
ye  prophesied, — for  he  that  prophesieth  is  greater 
than  he  that  speaketh  with  tongues,  unless  he  in- 
terpret, so  that  the  Church  may  receive  edification." 
Now  the  common  interpretation  would  here  require 
us  to  suppose,  that,  for  mere  ostentatious  purposes, 
a  man  miraculously  gifted  addressed  the  Church  in 
a  foreign  language  which  they  did  not  understand  ; 
whilst  at  the  same  time  he  had  the  power  of  inter- 
preting to  them  in  their  common  forms  of  speech. 
This  would  not  be  the  comparison  of  various  Gifts, 
but  the  gross  and  wilful  abuse  of  a  Gift,  —  an  abuse 
which,  if  it  had  existed,  St.  Paul  would  assuredly 
have  dealt  with  in  a  very  different  manner.     He  does 
not  seek  to  destroy  that  rapt  state  of  spiritual  emo- 
tion in  which  ejaculatory  prayer,  or  mystic  hymns,  or 
inarticulate  cries,  might  break  forth  from  the  moved 
soul,  and  be  its  truthful  language ;  —  it  was  not  in 
the  nature  of  St.  Paul  to  deny  the  existence  of  such 
spiritual  frames,  or  to  refuse  them  their  expression  ; 

18* 


210  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

—  he  would  only  confine  them  to  the  private  com- 
munion of  the  heart  with  God  ;  for  in  the  public 
assemblies  of  the  Church,  where  instruction,  and 
consolation,  and  exhortation  were  the  requisites, 
the  Trumpet  must  utter  no  uncertain  sounds.  The 
Prophet  might  speak  to  the  still,  small  voice,  and 
give  it  in  every  heart  the  force  and  clearness  with 
which  it  spoke  in  his  own  earnest  soul.  Or  the 
Teacher  might  place  the  truths  and  principles  of 
Christian  Knowledge  in  the  light  of  a  calm,  strong 
mind.  But  the  unstable  in  the  faith,  seeking  to  be 
edified,  or  the  weak  and  tempted  seeking  to  be 
strengthened  and  refreshed,  were  not  to  be  disap- 
pointed, or  distracted,  or  misled,  by  manifestations 
with  which  they  could  have  no  safe  sympathy,  by 
the  unprofitable  raptures  and  the  incoherent  utter- 
ances of  the  ecstatic  states  of  religious  Emotion. 
If  the  authority  of  St.  Paul  be  claimed  for  the  re- 
ality of  such  ecstatic  frames,  and  of  their  peculiar 
language  of  expression,  then,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
difference  of  circumstances,  let  it  be  remembered  that 
he  would  allow  them  no  public  manifestation,  —  and 
that  until  they  unfolded  themselves  in  the  light  of 
the  Understanding,  so  as  to  become  edifying  and 
elevating  to  others,  they  must  keep  silence  in  the 
Church,  and  be  known  only  to  the  secret  heart  and 
to  God.  In  the  Church  he  would  rather  utter  five 
words  so  as  to  be  understood,  than  ten  thousand 
expressions  of  the  peculiar  relations  of  his  own 
heart  to  God,  which  might  be  an  unprofitable  mys- 
tery to  others.  In  the  Church  he  would  pray  with 
the  spirit,  yet  so  as  to  unfold  to  the  understanding 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  211 

of  others  his  pious  thoughts  ;  and  he  would  sing  with 
the  spirit,  yet  so  as  to  unfold  in  the  hearts  of  others 
the  devout  feelings  of  his  hymn.  Only  children  in 
the  spirit,  —  those  who  were  weak,  and  babes,  in 
religious  intelligence  and  knowledge,  would  prefer 
the  ostentatious  display  of  mystic  utterance  to  the 
awakening  appeals  and  the  clear  instructions  of  the 
Prophet  and  the  Teacher.  And  it  was  not  in  this 
respect  that  the  Church  of  God  was  to  resemble 
children.  "  Brethren,  be  not  children  in  insight  and 
understanding:  in  your  knowledge  of  evil,  indeed, 
and  in  the  innocency  of  your  hearts,  be  children,  — 
but  in  understanding  be  men." 

This  Section  of  the  Epistle  opens  to  us  many  in- 
teresting views  of  the  influences  and  constitution  of 
the  first  Churches.  And,  first,  it  leads  us  to  doubt 
whether,  exclusively  of  the  Apostles,  it  was  ever  in- 
tended to  be  conveyed  that  there  was  any  supernat- 
ural operation  of  the  Spirit  of  God  on  the  early  be- 
lievers. "We  find  here  that  divine  energy  which  pro- 
duces the  various  forms  of  Mind,  following  the 
same  Laws  of  manifestation  which  universally  ob- 
tain, —  in  one  man  exhibiting  the  productiveness  of 
a  creative  spirit,  —  and  in  another  the  penetrating 
and  reflective  powers  of  Judgment  and  Discretion. 
The  same  relation  that  Genius  holds  to  the  Critical 
Faculty  did  the  Prophet  hold  to  the  Discerner  of 
Spirits.  I  need  not  remind  you  that  in  the  Scrip- 
tures the  usual  sense  of  the  word  Prophet  is  not  a 
Predicter  of  future  events,  but  the  earnest  utterer  of 
awakening  and  elevated  moral  Discourse.  The  man 
who  could  penetrate  the  Heart,  and  speak  to  the 


212  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Conscience,  was  the  Prophet  of  the  Scriptures.  In 
the  Prophets  mentioned  in  this  Chapter,  it  is  evident 
that  St.  Paul  did  not  recognize  "  pure  organs  of  the 
spirit  of  God,  in  whom  the  divine  and  human  might 
not  easily  be  confounded.  On  the  contrary,  the  ex- 
cesses of  such  a  mixture,  and  the  delusions  which 
might  prevail  from  regarding  the  suggestions  of  hu- 
man feeling  as  the  promptings  of  God,  are  distinctly 
guarded  against."*  The  Prophet  submitted  him- 
self to  the  judgment  of  the  Church ;  and  a  distinct 
class  of  minds  was  recognized,  whose  function  it 
was  to  determine  what  really  proceeded  from  the 
mind  of  God,  —  and  to  apply  a  sound  discretion  to 
test  the  worth  of  the  utterances  of  Impulse. 

We  see,  also,  the  free  and  equal  spirit  that  pre- 
vailed among  the  first  Communities  of  Christians, 
with  no  mingling  whatever  of  the  Ecclesiastical  el- 
ement. The  meetings  of  the  Church  were  evident- 
ly those  of  a  Popular  Assembly ;  —  and,  no  doubt, 
were  liable  to  the  evils  and  abuses  of  so  free  a  con- 
stitution. Its  members  would  naturally  occupy  them- 
selves with  those  offices  for  which  they  possessed 
peculiar  qualifications,  —  but  every  form  of  the  re- 
ligious mind  and  life  was  permitted  the  utmost  free- 
dom of  expression.  The  passage  from  the  twenty- 
sixth  to  the  thirty-third  verses  is  a  vivid  description 
of  the  confusion  that  might  arise  from  so  popular  a 
constitution,  unless  each  individual  was  under  the 
habitual  direction  of  the  spirit  of  Love  and  of  a 
sound  Mind. 

*  Neander. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XIV.  213 

The  only  exception  to  the  perfectly  unlimited  con- 
stitution of  the  Primitive  Church,  was  in  the  case 
of  its  female  Members.  But  in  this  respect,  Chris- 
tianity created  no  restriction ;  —  it  only  gave  a  sa- 
cred voice  to  the  almost  universal  feeling  of  Man- 
kind, and  sanctified  the  dictate  of  Nature. 

And,  lastly,  we  find  everywhere  instilled,  as  the 
essence  of  all  well-being,  and  well-doing,  —  without 
which  the  wisest  Constitution  is  but  a  lifeless  for- 
mula, and  the  highest  Powers  of  individual  endow- 
ment profitless  or  pernicious,  —  the  spirit  of  a  divine 
Sympathy  with  the  happiness  and  rights,  with  the 
peculiarities,  gifts,  graces,  and  endowments  of  other 
minds ;  which  alone,  whether  in  the  Family  or  in 
the  Church,  can  impart  unity,  and  effectual  working 
together  for  Good,  to  the  communities  of  Men.  It 
is  this  which  produces  the  highest  and  the  lowest 
virtues,  and  cements  them  in  the  unity  of  one  spirit 
and  one  purpose,  —  which  represses  the  impatience 
of  selfish  eagerness,  —  which  secures  what  St.  Paul 
calls  "the  decency  and  order"  of  the  Christian 
mind,  —  which  takes  the  sting  of  envy  out  of  the 
heart,  and  blesses  it  with  the  cordial  enjoyment  of 
whatever  in  others  is  Good  or  Great,  with  that  loving 
Cooperation  which  assimilates  the  temper  of  each 
man's  heart  to  the  spirit  of  Providence  itself,  —  and 
through  its  action  gives  him  at  once  the  full  sweet- 
ness of  his  life,  and  the  full  use  of  himself,  uncan- 
kered  by  self-seeking. 


PART   IV. 

(chaps.    XV.,   XVI.) 

CORINTHIAN    AND    PAULINE    VIEWS    OF    THE 

RESURRECTION.  —  CORINTH    AND  JERUSA- 

LEM    ONE    CHURCH    OF    CHRIST,    ONE 

FAMILY  OF  GOD.  —  CONCLUSION. 


PART   IV. 

(chapters    XV.,    XVI.) 


SECTION  I. 

STATE  OF  OPINION  ON  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  A  RESURRECTION. 

ST.  Paul's  arguments. — Christ's  resurrection  a  pat- 
tern  AND    A   PLEDGE. THE    CASE  OF   THE  APOSTLES,    ON 

THE  SUPPOSITION  OF  NO  RESURRECTION. THE  ANALO- 
GIES OF  NATURE. CELESTIAL  BODIES. BEFORE  CORRUP- 
TION CAN  INHERIT  INCORRUPTION,  THE  NECESSITY  OF 
CHANGE  ;     AND    THE    NEW    BIRTHS    OF    DEATH. 


CHAP.  XV.  1-58. 

1  And  I  declare  unto  you,  Brethren,  the  Gospel  which 
I  preached  to  you,  which  also  ye  received,  in  which  also 

2  ye  Stand ;  by  which  also  ye  are  saved,  if  ye  hold  by  the 
word  which  I   preached  to  you  ;  otherwise  ye  have  be- 

3  lieved  in  vain.     For,  first,  I  delivered  to  you  that  which 
I  received,  that  Christ  died  on  account  of  our  sins  accord- 

4  ing  to  the  Scriptures  ;  and  that  he  was  buried  ;  and  that 
he  was  raised  up  on  the  third  day,  according  to  the  Scrip- 

5  tures ;  and  that  he  was  seen  by  Cephas,  afterwards  by 

6  the  twelve.     Afterwards  he  was  seen  by  more  than  five 

19 


218  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

hundred  brethren  at  once,  of  whom  the  most  remain  till 

7  this  time,  but  some  of  them  have  fallen  asleep.  After- 
wards he  was  seen  by  James  ;  then  by  all  the  Apostles. 

8  And  last  of  all  he  was  seen  by  me  also,  as  by  one  born 

9  out  of  due  time.  For  I  am  the  least  of  the  Apostles,  as 
one  not  worthy  to  be  called  an  Apostle,  because  I  perse- 

10  cuted  the  Church  of  God.  But  by  the  grace  of  God  I  am 
that  I  am :  and  his  grace  which  was  towards  me  was  not 
in  vain,  but  I  labored  more  abundantly  than  they  all,  yet 

11  not  I,  but  the  grace  of  God  which  is  with  me.     Whether, 

12  then,  I  or  they,  so  we  preach,  and  so  ye  believed.  But 
if  Christ  be  preached  that  he  was  raised  from  the  dead, 
how  say  some  among  you  that  there  is  no  resurrection  of 

13  the  dead  ?     If  there  be  no  resurrection  of  the  dead,  then  is 

14  Christ  not  risen.     And  if  Christ  be  not  risen,  then  both 

15  vain  is  our  preaching,  and  vain  is  your  believing.  And 
we  are  found  also  false  witnesses  for  God,  since  we  have 
testified  concerning  God  that  he  raised  up  Christ,  whom  he 
raised  not  up,  if  so  it  be  that  the  dead  are  not  raised  up. 

16  For  if  the  dead  are  not  raised  up,  then  has  Christ  not 

17  been  raised  up.     But  if  Christ  has  not  been  raised  up, 

18  your  faith  is  vain ;  ye  are  yet  in  your  sins.  And  then 
they  that  have  fallen  asleep  in  Christ  have  perished. 

19  If  in  this  life  only  we  have  hope  in  Christ,  we  are  of 

20  all  men  most  to  be  pitied..  But  now  has  Christ  been 
raised  from  the  dead,  the  first  fruits  of  those  that  slept. 

21  For  since  through  man  was  death,  through  man  also  was 

22  a  resurrection  of  the  dead.     For  as  in  Adam  all  die,  so 

23  also  in  Christ  shall  all  be  made  alive.  But  every  man  in 
his  own  order :  Christ  the  first  fruits  •;  then  they  that  are 

24  Christ's  at  his  coming.  Then  is  the  end,  when  he  shall 
deliver  up  the  kingdom  to  God,  even  the  Father,  when 
he  shall  have  put  down  all  rule,  and  all  authority,  and 

25  power ;  for  he  must  reign  till  he  hath  put  all  enemies 


I.    COR.    CHAP.   XV.  219 

26  under  his  feet.     The  last  enemy  that  shall  be  destroyed 

27  is  death.  For  he  hath  put  all  things  under  his  feet.  But 
when  he  saith  that  all  things  are  put  under  him,  it  is  man- 
ifest that  it  is  with  the  exception  of  him  who  did  put  all 

28  things  under  him.  And  when  all  things  are  put  under 
him,  then  shall  the  Son  also  himself  be  subject  unto  him 
that  did  put  all  things  under  him,  that  God  may  be  all 
in  all. 

29  Else,  what  shall  they  do  who  are  baptized  for  the  dead, 
if  the  dead  are  not  raised  at  all  ?     Why  then  are  they 

30  baptized   for  them  ?     And  why  are  we  in  danger  every 

31  hour  ?     By  your  rejoicing  which  I  have  in  Christ  Jesus 

32  our  Lord,  I  die  daily.  If  I  have  fought  with  beasts  at 
Ephesus,  as  a  man,  what  advantageth  it  me  ?  If  the 
dead  are  not  raised,  let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow 

33  we  die.     Be  not  deceived  :  evil  communications  corrupt 

34  good  manners.  Awake  to  righteousness,  and  sin  not ;  for 
some  have  not  a  knowledge  of  God :  I  speak  to  your 
shame. 

35  But  some  one  will  say.  How  are  the  dead  raised  up  ? 

36  and  with  what  body  do  they  come  ?  Thou  inconsiderate ! 
that  which  thou  sowest  is  not   quickened,  unless  it  die. 

37  And  that  which  thou  sowest,  thou  sowest  not  the  body 
which  shall  be,  but  bare  grain,  it  may  be  of  wheat,  or  of 

38  some  other  grain.     But  God  giveth  to  it  a  body  as  it  hath 

39  pleased  him,  and  to  each  of  the  seeds  its  own  body.  All 
flesh  is  not  the  same  flesh  :  but  there  is  one  flesh  of  men, 
another  of  beasts,  another  of  fishes,  and  another  of  birds. 

40  There  are  also  celestial  bodies,  and  bodies  terrestrial  : 
but  the  glory  of  the  celestial  is  one,  and  the  glory  of  the 

41  terrestrial  another.  There  is  one  glory  of  the  sun,  and 
another  glory  of  the  moon,  and  another  glory  of  the  stars, 

42  for  star  differeth  from  star  in  glory.  So  also  is  the  resur- 
rection of  the  dead.     It  is  sown  in  corruption  :  it  is  raised 


220  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

43  in  incorruption.  It  is  sown  in  dishonor :  it  is  raised  in 
glory.     It  is  sown   in  weakness :  it  is  raised  in  power. 

44  It  is  sown  an  animal  body :  it  is  raised  a  spiritual  body. 
There   is  an  animal  body,  and  there  is  a  spiritual  body. 

45  And  so  it  is  written,  the  first  man  Adam  was  made  to  be 
a  living  soul :  the  last  Adam   to  be  a  life-giving  spirit. 

46  But  not  first  was  the  spiritual,  but  the  animal ;  afterwards 

47  the  spiritual.     The   first  man  was  of  the  earth,  earthy  : 

48  the  second  man,  the  Lord  from  heaven.*  As  was  the 
earthy,  such  are  they  also  that  are  earthy :  and  as  was 

49  the  heavenly,  such  are  they  also  that  are  heavenly.  And 
as  we  have  borne  the  image  of  the  earthy,  we  shall  also 
bear  the  image  of  the  heavenly. 

50  But  this  I  say,  brethren,  that  flesh  and  blood  cannot 
inherit  the   Kingdom  of  God  :    neither  doth  corruption 

51  inherit  incorruption.     Behold  I  tell  you  a  mystery :  we 
62  shall  not  all  sleep  :  but  we  shall  be  changed,  in  a  moment, 

in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  at  the  last  trump  ;  for  the 
trumpet  shall  sound,  and  the  dead  shall  be  raised  incor- 

53  ruptible,  and  we  shall  be  changed.  For  it  is  necessary 
that  this  corruptible   put   on  incorruption,  and  that  this 

54  mortal  put  on  immortality.  And  when  this  corruptible 
shall  have  put  on  incorruption,  and  this  mortal  shall  have 
put  on  immortality,  then  shall  be  brought  to  pass  the  say- 
ing that  is  written,  "  Death  is  swallowed  up  in  victory." 

55  0  Death,  where  is  thy  sting.?     O  Grave,  where  is  thy 

56  victory  ?     The  sting  of  Death  is  Sin  :  and  the  strength 

57  of  Sin  is  the  Law  :  but  thanks  be  to  God,  who  giveth  us 

58  the  Victory,  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ !  Wherefore, 
my  beloved  brethren,  be  ye  steadfast,  unmovable,  al- 
ways abounding  in  the  work  of  the  Lord,  knowing  that 
your  labor  is  not  in  vain  in  the  Lord. 

*  Or,  "  The  second  man,  from  heaven,  heavenly." 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  221 

The  Unity  of  an  Epistle  is  not  analogous  to  the 
Unity  of  a  Discourse,  a  Treatise,  or  a  Fiction.  The 
only  Unity  that  ought  to  belong  to  a  Letter  is  in  its 
close  relation  to  the  individual  circumstances  and 
prominent  interests  of  those  to  whom  it  is  addressed; 
< — and  its  very  completeness  in  this  respect,  —  the 
fulness  with  which  it  embraces  the  many  detached 
questions  and  anxieties  which  may,  at  the  same 
time,  be  pressing  on  the  minds  addressed,  —  will  ne- 
cessarily destroy  that  Unity  of  Thought,  which  in 
writings  of  another  class  is  properly  required.  It  is 
the  perfection  of  a  Letter,  that  it  touches  on  every 
point  of  immediate  interest  between  the  communi- 
cating minds,  —  that  it  leaves  no  painful  doubt  un- 
resolved, —  omits  no  question,  whose  unrelieved  so- 
licitude is  pressing  for  an  answer.  The  Unity  of 
such  a  composition  must  consist  in  the  fulness  with 
which  it  meets  the  wants,  and  satisfies  the  expecta- 
tions, of  the  receiver.  There  is  nothing  in  the  pre- 
ceding fourteen  Chapters  of  this  Epistle  to  the  Co- 
rinthians, which,  judging  merely  from  the  orderly 
development  of  Thought,  would  require  or  justify 
the  introduction  of  the  subject  of  the  Resurrection 
in  the  fifteenth.  It  appears  there  as  a  distinct  and 
independent  Topic,  and  points  to  some  peculiarity 
of  Belief,  among  a  portion  at  least  of  the  Corinthian 
Church,  on  this  central  Doctrine,  which  would  have 
rendered  the  Apostle's  advices  of  instruction  and 
admonition  essentially  fragmentary  and  incomplete, 
if  he  had  not  addressed  himself  to  its  enlightenment 
and  relief.  And  here  we  encounter  the  grand  diffi- 
culty in  the  interpretation  of  this  Chapter,  when  we 

19* 


222  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

seek  to  discover  what  was  the  peculiar  state  of  Be- 
lief among  the  Corinthians  respecting  the  Resurrec- 
tion from  the  dead,  to  which  St.  Paul  points  his  ar- 
guments and  exhortations.  We  have  no  historical 
account  of  their  peculiar  views,  —  and  "  no  informa- 
tion is  open  to  us,  but  what  we  can  infer  from  the 
objections  against  the  doctrine  of  the  Resurrection 
which  St.  Paul  seems  to  presuppose,  —  and  from  the 
reasonings  employed  by  him  in  its  favor,  —  adapted, 
as  we  may  conclude,  to  the  positions  from  which 
they  assailed  it." 

That  both  the  Fact,  and  the  Doctrine,  of  the  Res- 
urrection should  call  forth  formidable  objections  on 
the  part  of  professed  unbelievers,  could  create  no 
surprise ;  but  that  scepticism  on  these  points  should 
appear  in  the  very  heart  of  a  Christian  Church,  and 
should  coexist  with  their  faith  in  Christianity,  is  a 
matter  that  requires  to  be  explained.  If  this  Chap- 
ter had  been  found  in  his  first  address  to  some  Hea- 
then City  by  the  Missionary  Apostle,  there  could 
have  been  no  more  question  about  the  fitness  of  its 
topic,  than  there  is  of  its  cogency  and  power ;  but 
that  a  labored  argument  in  defence  of  the  Resurrec- 
tion should  be  addressed  to  those  whose  acceptance 
of  the  Gospel  is  not  disputed,  and  who,  in  every 
verse,  by  the  very  terms  of  the  Argument,  are  ac- 
knowledged to  be  Disciples,  is  a  circumstance  that 
opens  an  inquiry  of  no  common  difficulty  into  the 
state  of  opinion  in  the  Early  Church  on  the  mystic 
subject  of  the  Second  Coming  of  the  Lord,  and  its 
relation  to  Believers,  according  to  the  Messianic 
conception  of  the  Reign  of  Christ. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  223 

The  first  point  to  determine  is,  what  was  it  that 
the  Corinthians  doubted.  Was  it  the  Fact  of  the 
Lord's  Resurrection,  —  or  the  Doctrine  deduced  from 
it  of  a  Universal  Resurrection?^  It  was  the  Doc- 
trine solely ;  and  there  is  no  trace  that  the  Fact  of 
the  Resurrection  of  Christ  was  implicated  in  their 
peculiarity  of  view.  On  the  contrary,  St.  Paul  takes 
his  stand  on  the  Lords  Resurrection,  as  on  admitted 
ground,  and  reasons  from  it  to  consequences  subver- 
sive of  their  peculiarities.  He  recalls  indeed  to  their 
minds  the  leading  evidences  of  that  Event,  but  only 
with  the  view  of  placing  in  full  light  a  fundamental 
position,  the  legitimate  consequences  of  which  were 
inconsistent  with  the  other  tenets  in  connection  with 
which  they  held  it.  The  whole  Chapter  has  logical 
coherence  only  on  the  principle  that  belief  in  the 
Lord's  Resurrection  was  common  ground. 

There  is  no  part  of  our  Lord's  language  which 
was  more  misunderstood  by  his  followers,  than  that 
which  related  to  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man  ;  — 
and  the  adoption  by  him,  according  to  our  Gospels, 
of  a  style  of  expression  that  accorded  with,  and 
must  have  encouraged,  some  of  the  Jewish  ideas* 
of  the  Messianic  Kingdom,  is  a  circumstance  that 
must  always  be  connected  with  the  gravest  and  the 
freest  speculations  into  the  authoritative  character, 
and  literal  perfection,  of  the  New  Testament  Rec- 
ords. Either  his  words  have  come  to  us  through  a 
Jewish  coloring ;  —  or  he  himself,  and  at  the  latest 
period  of  his  life,  participated  in  the  common  expec- 
tations of  the  Jewish  Messiah,  a  supposition  which 
I  can  mention  only  to  reject;  —  or  the  conceptions 


224  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

of  the  Apostles  respecting  our  Lord's  future  coming 
were  erroneous,  with  this  addition,  that  the  imagery 
in  which  he  pictured  it,  and  which  they  misunder- 
stood, was  especially  liable  to  such  misapprehension : 
"  For  the  Son  of  Man  is  coming  with  the  Glory  of 
his  Father,  with  his  Angels ;  and  then  he  will  render 
to  every  one  according  to  his  deeds.  I  tell  you,  of  a 
truth,  there  are  some  of  those  standing  here  who 
shall  not  taste  of  death,  till  they  see  the  Son  of  Man 
coming  in  his  Kingdom."  Whether  it  arose  from  a 
misconception  of  such  words,  combining  with  the 
Millennial  elements  in  the  Jewish  anticipations  of 
Messiah,  —  or  whether  the  tendency  to  these  antici- 
pations was  so  strong  that  it  colored,  or  even  pro- 
jected, the  words,  —  it  is  certain  that  it  was  a  pre- 
vailing belief  in  the  Apostolic  Age,  that  the  second 
coming  of  the  Lord  might  be  looked  for  within  the 
lifetime  of  the  first  Disciples;  and  that  with  this 
event  St.  Paul  connected  the  end  of  the  present 
World,  and  the  opening  of  the  Life  Eternal.  This 
distinctly  appears  in  the  First  Epistle  to  the  Thessa- 
lonians :  "  If  we  believe  that  Jesus  died  and  rose 
again,  even  so  will  God  bring  with  him  those  also 
who  sleep  in  Jesus.  For  this  we  say  unto  you,  that 
we  who  are  alive,  and  remain  unto  the  coming  of 
the  Lord,  shall  not  prevent  [or  anticipate]  those  who 
are  asleep.  For  the  Lord  himself  will  descend  from 
heaven  with  a  shout,  with  the  voice  of  an  archangel, 
and  with  the  trump  of  God ;  and  the  dead  in  Christ 
will  rise  first ;  afterwards  we  who  are  alive  and  re- 
main shall  be  caught  up,  together  with  them,  into 
the  clouds,  to  meet  the  Lord  in  the  air :  and  so  shall 


I.   COR.    CHAP.   XV.  225 

we  ever  be  with  the  Lord."  In  the  Chapter  before 
us  we  find  the  same  anticipations,  of  the  resurrec- 
tion of  those  who  had  died  in  Christ,  at  the  second 
coming  of  the  Lord,  —  of  the  possible  occurrence 
of  that  event  within  the  lifetime  of  the  Apostle,  — 
of  the  glorious  and  instantaneous  transfiguration  of 
those  who,  being  still  in  the  flesh,  had  not,  through 
the  refining  processes  of  death,  developed  the  spirit- 
ual from  the  natural  body ;  and  of  the  opening  of 
the  Eternal  Reign  of  God  over  all  the  enemies  of 
his  Moral  Government :  "  Behold  I  show  you  a  mys- 
tery :  we  shall  not  all  sleep ;  but  we  shall  all  be 
changed^  in  a  moment,  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye, 
at  the  last  trump  ;  for  the  trumpet  shall  sound,  and 
the  dead  shall  be  raised  incorruptible,  and  we  shall 
be  changed ;  for  this  corruptible  must  put  on  incor- 
ruption,  and  this  mortal  must  put  on  immortality." 
"  As  in  Adam  all  die,  even  so  in  Christ  will  all  be 
made  alive;  but  every  man  in  his  own  order, — 
Christ  the  first  fruits,  —  afterwards  they  that  are 
Christ's  at  his  coming.  Then  cometh  the  End; 
when  he  shall  deliver  up  the  Kingdom  to  God,  even 
the  Father,  —  when  he  shall  have  put  down  all  Rule, 
and  all  Authority  and  Power ;  for  he  must  reign  till 
he  hath  put  all  enemies  under  his  feet. —  And  when 
all  things  shall  be  subjected  unto  Him,  then  will  the 
Son  himself  also  be  subjected  unto  Him  that  put  all 
things  under  Him,  that  God  may  be  all  in  all." 

With  this  coming  of  the  Lord  the  Apostles  always 
connect  the  General  Resurrection,  and  the  Immor- 
tal Existence  of  mankind.  With  the  Early  Fa- 
thers a  different  conception  prevailed.     "  They  be- 


226  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

lieved,  and  appealed  to  the  Apocalypse  as  their  au- 
thority, that  Jerusalem  was  to  be  rebuilt,  adorned, 
and  enlarged;  that  there  was  to  be  a  resurrection, 
in  which  the  followers  of  Christ  who  were  dead, 
together  with  the  patriarchs  and  prophets,  and  other 
pious  Jews,  were  to  return  to  life ;  that  these,  with  the 
body  of  Christians,  were  to  inhabit  that  city  with 
Christ,  rejoicing  for- a  thousand  years,  at  the  end  of 
which  would  follow  the  general  Resurrection  and 
Judgment  of  all.  This  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Mil- 
lennium,—  of  the  visible  reign  of  Christ  in  person 
upon  Earth ;  a  doctrine  which  the  earlier  Christians 
would  be  disposed  to  receive  the  more  eagerly,  in 
consequence  of  the  oppression,  persecution,  and  de- 
privations they  were  suffering."  * 

The  prevailing  expectation  of  the  immediate  re- 
turn of  Christ,  with  which  they  connected  the  fulfil- 
ment of  his  Promises,  and  the  perfection  of  the  Mes- 
sianic Reign,  led  to  that  peculiar  state  of  Belief  in 
the  Corinthian  Church  to  which  this  Chapter  is  ad- 
dressed. Living  in  the  daily  hope  of  the  Lord's  re- 
turn with  the  glory  of  his  Father,  and  looking  for 
the  Sign  of  the  Son  of  Man  in  Heaven,  they  nat- 
urally regarded  Death  as  an  intervening  Enemy  that 
might  separate  them  from  that  Day  of  the  Lord, 
and  deprive  them  of  the  joy  of  being  the  living  Wit- 
nesses of  his  Triumph,  the  immediate  sharers  in 
his  Kingdom.  The  peculiar  aim  of  the  Messianic 
Christian  would  thus  be  not  the  life  before^  but  the 
life  after  Christ's  return,  —  and  his  natural  anxiety 

*  Norton's  "  Statement  of  Reasons  for  not  believing  the  Doctrine  of 
the  Trinitarians  on  the  Person  of  Christ." 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  227 

would  be  to  outlive  the  intervening  period,  and  be 
found  alive  when  the  Lord  came.  It  appears  also, 
both  from  the  passage  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Thessa- 
lonians,  and  from  this  Chapter,  that  this  anxiety  to 
be  found  alive  at  the  daily  expected  coming  of  the 
Son  of  Man  was  heightened  by  coarse  and  material 
doubts  of  the  possibility  of  the  Resurrection  of  the 
Body.  We  read  in  the  Second  Epistle  to  Timothy, 
of  some  who  believed  that  the  Resurrection  was  past 
already^  understanding  it  in  a  purely  spiritual  and 
figurative  sense,  —  that  it  was  the  regeneration  of 
the  Believer's  soul,  the  awakening  from  the  death 
of  Sin  to  the  life  of  Righteousness,  —  in  accordance 
with  language  which  we  find  used,  figuratively  no 
doubt,  by  St.  Paul :  — "  If,  then,  ye  be  risen  with 
Christ,  set  your  affections  upon  things  above." 

Such,  then,  was  the  state  of  opinion  in  some  por- 
tion of  the  Corinthian  Church.  They  looked  daily 
for  the  return  of  Messiah,  —  and  they  feared  that 
none  but  those  who  survived  till  that  day  could 
be  sharers  in  his  Kingdom.  St.  Paul  addresses 
himself  to  this  state  of  mind  :  he  sympathizes  with 
their  expectation  of  the  immediate  return  of  the  Son 
of  Man ;  —  but  he  allays  their  fear  of  Death  by  his 
Doctrine  of  the  Resurrection,  —  that  all  who  have 
fallen  asleep  in  Christ  shall  be  raised  up  to  enter 
into  his  Glory.  We  shall  now  drop  these  early  pe- 
culiarities of  Belief,  and  consider  the  Apostle's  argu- 
ment in  its  more  universal  relations. 

I.  There  was  no  doubt  entertained  as  to  the  Res- 
urrection of  Christ.     "  I  delivered  unto  you,  first  of 


228  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

all,  that  which  I  also  received,  that  Christ  died, — 
that  he  was  buried,  and  that  on  the  third  day  he  rose 
again  according  to  the  Scriptures." — "So  I  preach, 
and  so  ye  believed.  Now  if  Christ  be  preached,  that 
he  rose  from  the  dead,  how  say  some  among  you  that 
there  is  no  Resurrection  of  the  dead  ?  For  if  there 
be  no  Resurrection  of  the  dead,  then  is  Christ  not 
risen;  —  and  if  Christ  be  not  risen,  then  is  our 
preaching  vain,  and  your  faith  is  vain  also."  Now 
this  argument  proceeds  on  the  admitted  fact,  that 
the  Resurrection  of  Christ,  at  least,  was  not  ques- 
tioned amongst  them.  And  if  one  Resurrection  was 
admitted,  why  not  a  Universal  Resurrection?  One 
established  case  destroys  the  theoretic  impossibility. 
There  is  no  difficulty  in  the  Resurrection  of  all  Man- 
kind, that  does  not  equally  attach  to  the  Resurrec- 
tion of  one  Man.  With  what  consistency,  then, 
could  they  deny  the  possibility  of  a  Resurrection  for 
Man,  and  yet  believe  in  the  resurrection  of  the  man 
Christ  Jesus,  —  or  believe,  as  they  did^  in  the  Resur- 
rection of  Jesus,  if,  as  was  said  by  some  among 
them,  there  was  no  resurrectio^i  from  the  dead? 
Either  a  universal  Resurrection  was  possible  and 
credible,  —  or  Christ  was  not  ris6n  at  all.  Either 
the  inductive  fact  must  be  denied,  —  or  the  induc- 
tion from  it  must  be  admitted.  But  to  deny  that 
the  Lord  was  risen,  would  be  to  deny  their  own 
faith,  —  and  so  their  own  faith  in  the  Resurrection 
of  one  Man  contended  with  the  fear  that  those 
that  had  fallen  asleep  in  Christ  had  perished. 

II.  St.  Paul  employs   the   admitted   fact   of  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.   XV.  229 

Resurrection  of  Christ  as  a  more  direct  argument 
for  the  Resurrection  of  all  Mankind,  —  as  not  only- 
demonstrative   of  its  possibility^  but  as  the  pledge 
and  pattern  of  a  Universal  Destiny.     Had  the  Res- 
urrection of  one  Man  been  merely  an  isolated  case, 
without  proof  that  he  was  intended  to  be  the  Rep- 
resentative of  our  Father's  purposes  for  all  men,  — 
still  it  would  have  done  much  to  create  and  confirm 
in  the  heart  the  faith  in  Immortality.     It  would  have 
demonstrated   at   least   the    possibility   of    Revival. 
"  There  would  be  an  end,"  as  has  been  said,  "  of  the 
Antagonist  proof  set  up  by  those  who  look  scorn- 
fully down  on  the  Valley  of  Death,  and  demand, 
*  Can  these  dry  bones  live  ? '     It  would  have  been 
the  decisive  reply  of  Nature  and  Providence  to  the 
inquiry,  —  their  decisive   refutation  of  the   implied 
assertion  of  impossibility.     Such   an  event  would 
be  a  declaration,  if  not  that  man  shall,  yet  that  he 
can  and  may  live  again.     There  would  be  an  end 
of  the  System  whose  doctrine  is  Annihilation,  and 
whose   precept   is    Licentiousness."     But   when   to 
this  proof  of  the  possibility  of  a   Universal  Resur- 
rection by  the  actual  Resurrection  of  one  Man,  you 
add,  that  by  the  hypothesis  that  one  man  was  the 
Representative  of  the  spiritual  destinies  of  Human- 
ity, that  his  Mission  was  to  embody  in  all  things 
the  will  of  God  concerning  us,  —  to  show  forth  the 
completed  existence  of  a  human  soul,  —  that  death 
was  one  of  his  links  of  Brotherhood  with  us,  and 
that  the   severing  grave  only  makes  us  one  in  and 
with  Christ  Jesus,  —  that  all  Mankind  have  a  com- 
mon nature  and  a  common  relation  to  God,  —  and 

20 


230  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

that  the  Son  of  Man  is  the  Example,  set  forth  by- 
Heaven,  of  their  common  inheritance,  —  then  do  we 
feel  the  full  force  of  St  Paul's  argument,  — "  Now 
is  Christ  risen  from  the  dead,  the  first  fruits  of  them 
that  slept.  For  since  by  Man  came  death,  by  Man 
came  also  the  Resurrection  of  the  dead."  If  Adam 
is  the  representative  of  the  animal  and  mortal  nature, 
Christ  is  the  representative  of  the  spiritual  and  im- 
mortal ;  —  and  not  more  universal  shall  be  the  Death 
of  the  Perishable,  than  the  Resurrection  of  the  Im- 
mortal. In  this  argument  St.  Paul  proceeds  upon 
the  two  great  facts  of  Christianity,  —  that  Jesus 
was  one  in  Nature  with  all  Mankind,  —  and  that  he 
was  set  forth  by  Providence  as  the  Representative 
of  the  spiritual  destinies  of  all  the  Sons  of  God.  If 
either  of  these  is  denied,  there  is  no  coherence  in  his 
words. 

III.  St.  Paul  argues  for  the  Resurrection  of  all 
Mankind,  from  the  moral  consequences  that  would 
follow  from  the  denial  of  that  Doctrine.  And  here 
we  may  trace  distinctly  the  peculiar  state  of  opinion 
to  which  we  have  referred,  though  it  does  not  con- 
fine within  its  own  limits  the  sentiment  of  the  pas- 
sage. "  If  in  this  life  only  we  have  hope  in  Christ, 
we  are  of  all  men  most  to  be  commiserated."  If 
only  those  who  remained  to  the  coming  of  the  Lord 
had  hope  of  the  glory  of  Christ,  then  the  zeal  of 
Apostleship,  and  the  missionary  spirit  of  the  Gos- 
pel, and  all  the  chances  of  persecution  and  violent 
death  in  that  glorious  warfare,  were  but  elements  of 
fear  and  misery  to  the  Disciple,  who,  through  very 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  231 

faithfulness  to  his  great  trust,  might  perish  before 
that  Day  of  the  Lord,  and  have  no  participation  in 
his  Kingdom.  Such  a  fear  would  counsel  the  Lord's 
Apostles  to  be  silent  about  the  Gospel  before  the 
face  of  its  enemies,  lest  the  Death  that  sealed  their 
tongue  should  also  seal  the  Tomb  from  which  no 
Resurrection  was  expected  ;  —  and,  with  such  views, 
if  there  was  any  certain  prospect  of  Death  before 
the  coming  of  the  Lord,  what  unanswerable  refuta- 
tion could  be  given  of  the  wisdom  of  the  maxim,  — 
"  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die."  St. 
Paul  does  not  charge  this  lieentious  precept  upon 
the  Corinthians  as  the  root  of  their  unbelief;  —  on 
the  other  hand,  he  exhibits  it  as  one  of  the  natural 
consequences  of  their  state  of  opinion,  the  mere  pre- 
sentation of  which  should  make  them  recoil  from 
such  a  Doctrine.  Errors  of  belief,  though  they  do 
not  spring  from  corrupt  sources,  may  yet  have  a 
natural  connection  with  immoral  consequences,  and 
insensibly  lead  to  them.  The  Doctrine  of  the  Res- 
urrection, or  of  Immortality,  might  be  doubted  by 
the  purest  mind,  —  but  such  a  mind  would  have  es- 
pecial need  to  awake  up  to  Righteousness,  lest  its 
belief  should  unconsciously  unstring  the  Soul,  and 
take  away  the  spiritual  supports  of  Virtue. 

In  the  argument  for  the  Resurrection  of  the  dead 
from  the  admitted  faith  and  practices  of  the  Corin- 
thians themselves,  there  is  a  passage  of  considerable 
obscurity :  "  If  the  dead  rise  not  at  all,  what  shall 
they  do  who  are  baptized  for  the  dead  ?  Why  are 
they  then  baptized  for  the  dead  ?  "  "What  was  un- 
derstood by  Baptism  for  the  dead,  it  is  now  very 


232  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

generally  admitted  that  it  is  impossible  to  deter- 
mine. It  is  said  that  in  the  Early  Church  there  was 
a  representative,  or  vicarious,  baptism  for  one  who 
died  before  the  rite  had  been  administered.  There 
is  no  proof,  however,  of  its  existence  in  the  Apostol- 
ic age,  —  nor  is  it  likely  that  St.  Paul  would  have 
noticed  such  a  superstition,  however  indirectly,  with- 
out some  rebuke  or  exposure  of  its  unspiritual  char- 
acter. The  simplest  explanation,  though  not  flow- 
ing from  the  words  without  some  obscurity  of  ex- 
pression, is  that  which  regards  "  baptism  for  the  dead  " 
as  a  baptism  into  the  views  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ 
in  relation  to  the  dead,  —  with  an  implied  reference 
to  their  state,  and  faith  in  their  Resurrection.* 

IV.  St.  Paul  meets  the  objections  which  a  scepti- 
cal materialism  would  most  obviously  suggest  to  the 
doctrine  of  a  Kesurrection.  These  objections  are  of 
two  kinds :  How  can  a  mouldering  frame  revive,  — 
and  what  quality  of  body  could  be  adapted  to  an 
immortal  existence  ?  "  How  are  the  dead  raised  up, 
—  and  with  what  body  do  they  come  ?  "  St.  Paul, 
borrowing  the  illustration  from  Christ,  meets  the 
difficulty  by  an  analogy  drawn  from  our  experience 
of  other  organisms :  Unless  a  grain  of  wheat  fall 
into  the  ground  and  die,  it  abideth  alone,  —  but  if  it 
die,  it  bringeth  forth  much  fruit.  The  perishing  of 
the  seed  corn  is  not  only  no  difficulty,  but  is  an  es- 

*  Some  commentators  suppose  the  Apostle  to  have  reference  to  an 
idea,  that  all  who  were  baptized  were  baptized_/or  the  benefit  of  the  dead, 
by  contributing  to  a  certain  Complement  of  believers,  or  Fulness  of 
the  Body  of  Christ,  wliich  must  precede  his  coming. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  233 

sential  condition  of  the  germination  of  the  new 
body.  Cut  the  seed  or  the  bulb,  and  there  to  the 
eye  of  science  the  fair  form  of  the  perfect  plant  is 
distinctly  traced ;  and  so,  to  the  eye  of  God,  in  the 
corruptible  seed  of  the  human  frame  may  be  envel- 
oped the  germ  of  the  immortal  and  spiritual  body. 
If  we  had  no  experience  of  those  delicate  and  splen- 
did forms  springing,  in  the  freshness  of  their  glory, 
from  the  bosom  of  decay.  Scepticism,  no  doubt, 
would  be  ready  to  interpose  its  rash  fiat  of  impossi- 
bility :  and  because  we  have  only  experience  of  the 
planting  of  the  mortal  germ  of  Humanity,  and  have 
not  seen  the  wondrous  bursting  into  Life  of  the  ce- 
lestial body,  shall  we  disregard  the  analogies  by 
which  God  would  aid  our  Faith,  and  fall  under  the 
Apostle's  charge  of  having  a  mind  without  spiritu- 
al perception,  and  slow  to  learn  ?  "  O  man  with- 
out understanding,  that  which  thou  sowest  is  not 
quickened  except  it  die."  And,  then,  as  to  the  sec- 
ond objection,  of  how  can  this  human  frame  become 
accommodated  to  a  spiritual  and  imperishable  Life, 
the  same  analogy  suggests  an  answer :  "  That  which 
thou  sowest,  thou  sowest  not  the  body  that  shall  be, 
but  bare  grain ;  —  but  God  giveth  it  a  body  as  it 
Tiath  pleased  Him,  —  and  to  every  seed  its  ovm  bodyP 
A  root,  a  seed,  is  dropped  into  the  Earth,  and  from  it 
the  chemistry  of  God  educes  the  loveliest  forms,  the 
most  delicate  tints  and  odors,  the  most  ethereal  and 
spiritual  beauty.  Follow  the  analogy  :  —  and  if  such 
are  the  new  Bodies  that  God  gives  to  the  seeds  of 
unconscious  Matter,  and  to  the  spring- times  of  Earth, 
—  what  may  be  the  glory  of  the  spiritual  Body  from 

20* 


234  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

a  seed  that  is  now  an  organism  for  the  souls  of  His 
children,  and  whose  spring-time  is  reserved  for  the 
Celestial  World  ?  Nor  are  we  confined  in  our  con- 
ceptions of  that  spiritual  Body  by  our  present  ex- 
perience of  organized  existences ;  for  there  are  bod- 
ies terrestrial,  and  bodies  celestial,  —  and  as  much 
as  the  glory  of  the  one  transcends  the  glory  of  the 
other,  may  our  Resurrection  Body  transcend  the  im- 
perfect seed  of  our  Earthly  frame.  "  The  glory  of 
the  terrestrial  is  one,  and  the  glory  of  the  celestial  is 
another.  So  also  is  the  resurrection  of  the  dead. 
It  is  sown  in  corruption  ;  it  is  raised  in  incorruption  : 
it  is  sown  in  dishonor ;  it  is  raised  in  glory :  it  is 
sown  in  weakness  ;  it  is  raised  in  power :  it  is  sown 
a  natural  body  ;  it  is  raised  a  spiritual  body."  The 
natural  Body  is  an  organism  fitted  for  the  develop- 
ment and  action  of  the  animal  man :  the  spiritus^ 
Body  is  an  organism  fitted  for  the  development  and 
action  of  the  spiritual  nature ;  and  the  spiritual 
Body  holds  to  the  natural  Body  a  relation,  which 
is  emblemed  by  that  which  the  most  glorious  of 
Nature's  forms  bears  to  the  seed  from  which  it 
springs. 

V.  Lastly,  St.  Paul  explains  the  Mystery  of  the 
change  passed  upon  us  by  Death.  We  die,  —  be- 
cause Flesh  and  Blood  cannot  inherit  the  Kingdom 
of  God,  —  and  we  must  all  be  changed^  in  order  that 
this  corruptible  may  put  on  Incorruption,  and  that 
this  mortal  may  put  on  Immortality.  Not  from  our 
ashes,  but  from  our  spirit,  should  we  take  the  lesson 
of  Death,  —  and  seek  the  interpretation  of  its  mys- 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XV.  235 

tery.  Not  into  the  grave  of  the  body,  but  to  the 
home  of  the  soul,  should  the  gaze  of  a  thinking'  Be- 
ing be  directed ;  and  if  we  have  any  Christian  Faith^ 
as  often  as  the  great  change  passes  on  a  familiar 
form,  in  order  that  the  Mortal  may  put  on  Immor- 
tality, —  to  us  should  Death  be  swallowed  up  in 
Victory.  Death  has  no  sting  but  Sin  :  —  the  pure, 
the  righteous,  the  faithful,  —  whatever  to  themselves 
may  be  the  passing  fear  and  doubt  of  nature,  —  in 
the  sight  of  others  are  blessed  in  their  death ;  they 
fall  asleep  in  Jesus,  and  are  found  with  God.  Sin 
is  the  Shadow  in  the  Valley  of  Death;  —  take  away 
the  fear  of  a  violated  Law,  and  in  its  place  fill  the, 
heart  with  the  Love  of  God  as  it  wrought,  and  suf- 
fered, and  freely  laid  down  its  life,  in  Jesus,  —  and 
we,  too,  should  be  ready  to  lie  down  in  death  with 
Christ,  that  we  might  rise  and  live  with  him  for  ever. 

Thanks  be  to  God  who  giveth  us  the  Victory 
through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  —  the  victory  of  the 
Spirit  over  the  Senses,  —  of  Faith  over  Sight,  —  of 
Love  and  the  filial  heart  of  Duty  over  the  fears  of  a 
legal  Obedience  and  a  grudging  Service !  Sons  of 
God,  —  this  is  the  Victory  of  our  filial  Faith,  —  that 
"  God  hath  not  given  us  a  spirit  of  fear,  —  but  of 
power,  and  of  love,  and  of  a  sound  mind ! 

"  Wherefore,  my  beloved  brethren,  be  ye  stead- 
fast, unmovable,  always  abounding  in  the  work  of 
the  Lord,  forasmuch  as  ye  know  that  your  labor  is 
not  in  vain  in  the  Lord." 


236  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION    II. 

SYMPATHY  OF  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH  FOR  THE  DISTRESSED 

BRETHREN      OF      JERUSALEM.  CONTRIBUTION      TOWARDS 

THEIR  RELIEF  :  AND  ST.  PAUL's  VIEWS  OF  DUTY  IN  MAT- 
TERS OF  MONEY.  HIS  NEXT  VISIT  TO  CORINTH. TIMO- 
THY.   APOLLOS.  EXHORTATION.  —  CONCLUSION. 


CHAP.   XVI.  1-24. 


1  Now  concerning  the  collection  for  the  Saints,  as  I  have 
given  direction  to  the  Churches  of  Galatia,  so  do  ye  also. 

2  On  the  first  day  of  each  week  let  each  of  you  lay  by 
him,  Storing  according  as  he  hath  prospered,  that  there 

3  may  be  no  collections  when  I  come.  And  when  I  come, 
whomsoever  ye  shall  approve,  I  will  send  them  with  let- 

4  ters  to  bear  your  gift  to  Jerusalem.  And  if  it  be  right 
that  I  also  should  go,  they  shall  go  with  me. 

5  Now  I  will  come  to  you  when  I  pass  through  Macedo- 

6  nia,  for  I  do  pass  through  Macedonia.  And  it  may  be  I 
shall  abide  with  you,  and  even  winter  with  you,  that  ye 

7  may  send  me  forward,  wherever  I   shall  go.     For  I  do 
,  not  wish  to  see  you  now  by  the  way ;  for  I  hope  to  re- 

8  main  some  time  with  you,  if  the  Lord  permit.     But  I  will 

9  remain  in  Ephesus,  until  Pentecost.  For  a  great  and 
effectual  door  is  opened  to  me ;  and  there  are  many  op- 
posers. 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  237 

10  Now  if  Timothy  come,  see  that  he  be  without  fear 
among  you ;  for  he  worketh  the  work  of  the  Lord  even 

11  as  I.  Let  no  one  then  despise  him,  but  send  him  forward 
in  peace,  that  he  may  come  to  me ;  for  I  wait  for  him 
with  the  brethren. 

12  And  concerning  our  brother  ApoUos,  I  much  entreated 
him  to  go  to  you  with  the  brethren,  and  it  was  by  no 
means  his  wish  to  go  now  ;  but  he  will  go  when  it  is  sea- 
sonable. 

13  Watch  ye  ;  stand  fast  in  the  faith  ;  acquit  ye  like  men  ; 

14  be  strong.     Let  all  your  things  be  done  in  Love.     And  I 

15  beseech  you,  brethren,  (ye  know  the  household  of  Stepha- 
nas, that  it  is  the  first  fruits  of  Achaia,  and  that  they  have 

16  addicted  themselves  to  the  service  of  the  saints,)  that  ye 
submit  yourselves  to  such,  and  to  every  fellow-worker 

17  and  laborer.  I  am  glad  of  the  coming  of  Stephanas,  and 
Fortunatus,  and  Achaicus  :  for  what  was  deficient  on  your 

18  part  they  have  supplied.  For  they  have  refreshed  my 
spirit  and  yours  :  wherefore  acknowledge  them  as  such. 

19  The  Churches  of  Asia  salute  you.  Aquila  and  Priscilla 
greet  you  much  in  the  Lord,  with  the  Church  that  is  in  their 

20  house.     All  the  brethren  greet  you.     Greet  one  another 

21  with  a  holy  kiss.     The  Salutation  by  mine  own  hand,  of 

22  Paul :  If  any  love  not  the  Lord  Jesus,  let  him  be  separat- 

23  ed;  the  Lord  is  at  hand  [Anathema,  Maran-atha] .     The 

24  grace  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  be  with  you.  My  love 
be  with  you  all,  in  Christ  Jesus !     Amen. 


It  is  said  that  the  manifestation  of  a  brotherly  in- 
terest by  one  Community  towards  another,  a  general 
direction  of  effectual  sympathy  toward  distant  suf- 
ferers, is  peculiar  to  Christianity.     It  dates  with  the 


238  FIRST     EPISTLE     TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Gospel,  and  appears  there  for  the  first  time,  as  a 
new  fact  in  History.  There  is  no  parade  made  of  it 
in  the  Records,  nor  any  claim  of  appropriation  on 
this  new  development  of  the ^  spirit  of  Humanity. 
It  appears  there  as  the  natural  fruit  of  that  spiritual 
sentiment  which  connects  the  Brotherhood  of  Man 
with  the  Universal  Father,  —  and  it  is  left  to  the 
philosophical  Critic,  in  some  after  age,  to  discover 
and  proclaim,  that  it  is  an  entirely  new  phenomenon 
in  the  Moral  History  of  Mankind.  Such  is  the  un- 
consciousness in  which  the  Spirit  and  the  Truth  of 
Goodness  ever  brings  forth  its  fruit,  in  quietness  of 
heart.  Acting  from  an  inward  movement,  from  the 
growing  life  of  an  affection,  its  noblest  deeds  are 
but  simple  faithfulness  to  itself;  and  what  appears 
extraordinary  in  the  eyes  of  others  not  stirred  by  the 
same  sentiment,  is  but  spontaneous  and  natural  to 
it.  The  Christian  heart,  like  Christianity  itself, 
ripens  its  own  blessed  fruits,  but  makes  no  note  of 
how  far  it  differs  from  the  common  world. 

But  now,  after  the  fact  has  been  pointed  out  by 
the  historical  philosopher,  it  is  not  difficult  to  per- 
ceive how  this  last  and  purest  development  of  the 
spirit  of  Humanity  —  an  approach  on  the  part  of 
His  children  to  the  tenderness  and  universality  of 
the  Providence  of  God  —  should  be  reserved  to  be 
the  product  of  the  Christian  sentiment.  Christianity 
first  placed  men  in  spiritual  relations  to  one  another. 
It  recognized  their  identity  of  Nature,  and  their  one 
Heavenly  Father ;  and  on  each  child  of  God  neces- 
sity was  laid  to  act  in  God's  spirit,  —  in  every  man 
to  recognize  a  Brother,  and  to  unite  that  brother 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  239 

with  the  whole  Family  of  the  Heavenly  *  Parent. 
Before  Christianity,  there  was  no  example  of  a  Com- 
munity applying  itself  to  the  elevation  and  enlight- 
enment of  another  and  distant  Community.  Poly- 
theism could  never  make  of  all  Mankind  one  Church 
and  one  Family. 

St.  Paul,  who  acted  in  the  spirit  of  this  relation- 
ship, had  the  satisfaction  of  awakening  it  wherever 
he  went,  and  of  making  it  fruitful  in  charities  like 
his  own.  Corinth  becomes  united  to  Jerusalem  by 
mercy  and  beneficence  ;  —  so  true  is  it  that  the  spir- 
itual sentiment,  the  relation  of  each  individual  to 
the  same  God,  is  the  fountain  of  the  practical  vir- 
tues, of  the  tenderest  and  strongest  sympathies,  and 
of  all  the  finest  humanities  of  Life.  The  parent 
Church  had  sent  the  blessing  of  the  Gospel  to  the 
distant  Grecian  City,  —  and  Corinth  sends  what  she 
has,  and  can  spare,  to  lighten  the  afflictions  of  the 
persecuted  Christians  in  Jerusalem.  It  was  no  slight 
progress  of  the  Spirit  of  Jesus,  that  within  half  a 
century  Greece  and  Judea  had  been  brought  into 
such  connections;  —  and  it  is  no  slight  call  to  indi- 
vidual faithfulness  and  courage,  that  one  man  was 
the  main  agent  of  that  change. 

The  Christians  of  Palestine  were  depressed  and 
persecuted.  They  were  poor  in  circumstance  and 
station,  —  and  sunk  below  even  their  natural  pover- 
ty by  the  exclusive  and  persecuting  spirit  of  the 
privileged  order,  and  of  the  established  Priesthood. 
They  were  losing  their  life  in  this  world,  that  they 
might  keep  it  unto  Life  eternal.  In  their  behalf 
Paul   enlisted   the   brotherly  affections  of  the  Gen- 


240  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tiles.  The  treasures  of  Faith  and  Knowledge,  the 
spiritual  riches  of  Christ  Jesus,  flowed  from  Pales- 
tine, and  it  was  no  mean  proof  that  they  had  accom- 
plished that  whereunto  they  were  sent,  that  there 
flowed  back  again  from  the  Gentiles  a  stream  of 
Mercy.  "  Now  concerning  the  collection  for  the 
saints,  as  I  gave  order  to  the  Churches  of  Galatia, 
so  do  ye  likewise.  Upon  the  first  day  of  each  week, 
let  each  of  you  lay  by  him  in  store,  as  he  hath  pros- 
pered, that  there  may  be  no  collection  when  I  come." 
The  Duty  is  not  insisted  on,  —  the  Spirit  of  Lib- 
erality is  not  urged,  —  the  Principle  and  Affection 
are  taken  for  granted,  and  only  the  best  method 
of  Administration  pointed  out,  —  that  time  and 
trouble  may  be  economized,  and  the  fullest  effect 
given  both  to  their  capacity,  and  their  will  to  help. 

It  is  commonly  supposed  that  the  mention  of 
the  first  day  of  the  week  fixes  that  early  date  for' 
the  ecclesiastical  observance  of  Sunday,  as  the 
Lord's  Day.  But  this  is  by  no  means  implied  in 
the  passage  ;  —  it  contains  no  allusion  to  a  public 
collection,  —  on  the  other  hand,  it  distinctly  states, 
more  distinctly  than  in  our  English  Version,  "  Let 
each  man  lay  by  him,  at  home^  according  as  he 
hath  prospered";  —  and  it  is  certain  that,  in  St. 
Paul's  view,  the  observance  of "  Days  "  did  not  be- 
long to  the  Christian  estimate  of  the  fulness  of  the 
spiritual  Life.  St.  Paul  mentions  the  first  day  of 
the  week  as  that  in  which  they  were  to  examine, 
and  lay  aside  for  purposes  of  Mercy  whatever  could 
be  spared  from  the  prosperity  which  God  had  given 
them,  —  because   it   was    evidently   expedient  that 


f  I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  241 

some  marked  day  should  be  allotted  for  that  work, 
—  and  the  last  day  of  the  week,  as  being  the 
Jewish  Sabbath,  still  regarded  by  the  Jewish  con- 
verts, was  not  available.  It  would  appear  that  the 
first  Christians  assembled  every  day,  as  opportunity 
offered,  for  worship  and  communion  of  spirit,  —  and 
that  the  first  day  of  the  week  was  gradually  set 
apart  for  these  purposes,  because  the  interferences 
of  worldly  business,  and  the  outward  relations  of 
different  men,  rendered  such  undetermined  Com- 
munion liable  to  interruption  and  uncertainty.  It 
is  obvious,  too,  that  not  until  Christianity  had 
spread  so  extensively  as  to  be  able  to  dictate  its  own 
Laws  to  a  Community,  could  it  appoint  a  Day  for 
general  Worship,  without  interfering  with  all  the 
relations  of  Society,  in  a  manner  most  foreign  to  its 
Spirit.  "  According  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Apostle 
Paul,"  says  Neander,  "  the  Mosaic  Law  in  its  whole 
extent  had  lost  its  value  as  such  to  Christians. 
Hence  a  transference  of  the  Old  Testament  com- 
mand of  the  sanctity  of  the  Sabbath  to  the  New 
Testament  point  of  view  was  not  admissible.  Who- 
ever considered  himself  subject  to  one  such  com- 
mand, in  St.  Paul's  judgment  placed  himself  again 
under  the  yoke  of  the  whole  Law ;  his  inward  life 
was  thereby  brought  into  servitude  to  outward  earth- 
ly things,  and,  sinking  into  Jewish  nationalism,  de- 
nied the  Universality  of  the  Gospel;  for  on  the 
ground  of  the  Gospel,  the  whole  life  became  in  an 
equal  manner  related  to  God,  and  served  to  glorify 
Him,  —  and  thenceforth  no  opposition  existed  be- 
tween what  belonged  to  the  world  and  what  be- 

21 


242  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

lono:ed  to  Him.  Thus  all  the  days  of  the  Christian 
Life  must  be  equally  holy  to  the  Lord  ;  hence  St. 
Paul  says  to  the  Galatian  Christians  who  had  al- 
lowed themselves  to  be  so  far  led  astray  as  to  ac- 
knowledge the  Mosaic  Law  as  binding,  — "  After 
that  ye  have  known  God,  or  rather  (by  his  pitying 
love)  have  been  led  to  the  knowledge  of  God,  how 
turn  ye  again  to  these  weak  and  beggarly  elements, 
whereunto  ye  desire  again  to  be  in  bondage.  Ye 
observe  days,  and  months,  and  times,  and  years.  I 
fear  for  you,  lest  I  have  bestowed  labor  upon  you  in 
vain."  He  fears  that  his  labors  among  them,  to 
make  them  Christian,  had  been  in  vain,  and  for  this 
very  reason,  because  they  reckoned  the  observance  of 
certain  days  as  holy  to  be  an  essential  part  of  Re- 
ligion. The  Apostle  does  not  here  oppose  the  Chris- 
tian feasts  to  the  Jewish,  but  he  considers  the  whole 
reference  of  Religion  to  certain  days  as  something 
quite  foreign  to  the  exalted  spirit  of  Christian  free- 
dom, and  belonging  rather  to  the  genius  of  Judaism 
or  Heathenism. 

"  An  unquestionable  and  decided  mention  of  the 
ecclesiastical  observance  of  Sunday  among  the  Gen- 
tile Christians,  we  cannot  find  in  the  times  of  the 
Apostle  Paul.  In  1  Cor.  xvi.  2,  if  we  examine  his 
language  closely,  he  says  no  more  than  this,  —  that 
every  one  should  lay  by,  in  his  own  house,  on  the 
first  day  of  the  week,  whatever  he  was  able  to  save. 
We  may  fairly  understand  the  whole  passage  to 
mean,  that  every  one  on  the  first  day  of  the  week 
should  lay  aside  what  he  could  spare,  so  that,  when 
Paul  came,  every  one  might  be  prepared,  and,  by 


I.   COR.    CHAP.   XVI.  243 

putting  the  several  contributions  together,  the  col- 
lection of  the  whole  Church  would  be  at  once 
made.  The  origin  of  the  religious  observance  of 
Sunday  must  be  deduced  from  the  peculiar  cir- 
cumstances of  the  Gentile  Christians.  "Where  the 
condition  of  the  Churches  did  not  admit  of  daily 
meetings  for  devotion,  —  although  in  the  nature  of 
Christianity  no  necessity  could  exist  for  such  a  dis- 
tinction, —  although  on  Christian  ground  all  days 
were  to  be  considered  as  equally  holy,  in  an  equal 
manner  devoted  to  God,  —  yet  on  account  of  pecu- 
liar outward  relations,  such  a  distinction  of  a  par- 
ticular day  was  adopted  for  religious  Communion. 
They  did  not  choose  the  Sabbath  which  the  Jewish 
Christians  celebrated,  in  order  to  avoid  the  risk  of 
mingling  Judaism  and  Christianity,  —  and  because 
another  day  was  more  closely  associated  with  Chris- 
tian sentiments.  The  sufferings  and  resurrection 
of  Christ  appeared  as  the  central  point  of  Chris- 
tian knowledge  and  practice :  since  his  resurrec- 
tion was  viewed  as  the  foundation  of  all  Christian 
joy  and  hope,  it  was  natural  that  the  day  which 
was  connected  with  the  remembrance  of  this  event 
should  be  specially  devoted  to  Christian  Commun- 
ion." * 

There  is  another  point,  in  connection  with  this 
benefaction  to  the  persecuted  Christians  at  Jerusa- 
lem, which  claims  notice,  as  disclosing  something 
of  the  individual  character  of  St.  Paul.  He  con- 
stantly refuses  to  be  placed  alone  in  matters  of 
trust,  into  which,  from  the  absence  of  examination 

*  Biblical  Cabinet. 


244  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

and  inspection,  it  was  possible  abuse  might  creep. 
"  And  when  I  come,  whomsoever  ye  shall  approve, 
those  will  I  send  with  letters  to  carry  your  gift 
unto  Jerusalem :  and,  if  it  be  meet  that  I  should  go 
also,  they  shall  go  with  me."  In  all  such  cases 
there  was  a  strictness  which,  with  St.  Paul's  unsus- 
pected character,  might  appear  scrupulous  and  fas- 
tidious :  but  the  unsuspected  character  is  that  which 
never  needlessly  consents  to  be  placed  in  circum- 
stances of  suspicion.  And  in  matters  of  this  na- 
ture, and  in  a  world  where  virtue  is  weak,  and 
calumny  is  strong,  and  temptation  is  perilous,  and 
suspicion,  as  far  as  reputation  is  concerned,  is  al- 
most as  fatal  as  guilt,  the  example  of  the  Apostle 
in  the  strict  demand  that  responsible  colleagues, 
"  elected  for  that  purpose  by  the  contributors  them- 
selves," should  be  associated  with  him  in  the  distri- 
bution of  public  bounty,  is  worthy  of  all  imitation, 
—  an  admirable  proof  that  an  honorable  prudence, 
a  care  for  reputation  in  the  smallest  things,  may 
unite  with  the  loftiest  enthusiasm  of  the  religious 
mind ;  and  if  some  of  the  greatest  names  in  our 
history  had  possessed  something  of  this  practical 
wisdom  and  salutary  fear,  we  should  not  have  had 
the  mournful  and  corrupting  spectacle  of  genius 
and  character,  great  in  all  things  else,  fallen  under 
the  meanness  of  petty  degradation,  —  their  glory 
associated  in  everlasting  remembrance  with  the 
depths  to  which  they  stooped, — -and  all  because 
they  reverenced  not  the  Christian  principle  to  avoid 
even  the  appearance  of  evil,  and  dared  to  meet  an 
unnecessary  temptation.      St.  Paul  would   neither 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  245 

expose  himself  to  a  temptation,  —  nor  in  such  things 
commit  his  character  to  the  world  :  "  We  have  sent," 
says  he,  speaking  on  the  same  subject,  in  another 
place,  —  "we  have  sent  that  brother  who  was  chosen 
of  the  Churches  to  travel  with  us,  with  that  bounty 
which  was  administered  by  us  to  the  glory  of  the 
same  Lord,  and  to  show  your  readiness  of  mind,  — 
taking  care  for  this,  that  no  man  should  blame  us  in 
our  administration  of  this  abundance,  providing  for 
things  honest,  not  only  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,  but 
also  in  the  sight  of  men,"  —  that  is,  not  resting  in 
the  consciousness  of  his  own  integrity,  nor,  on  such 
a  subject,  in  God's  knowledge  of  it, —  but  careful  to 
have  it  manifest  in  the  public  sight. 

"  At  the  time  of  his  writing  this  Epistle  to  Cor- 
inth, St.  Paul  had  formed  an  extensive  plan  for  his 
future  labors.  During  his  stay  of  several  years  in 
Achaia,  and  at  Ephesus,  he  had  laid  a  sufficient 
foundation  for  the  extension  of  the  Gospel  among 
the  nations  who  used  the  Greek  language,  and  he 
now  wished  to  transfer  his  ministry  to  the  West,  — 
to  visit  Rome  on  his  way  to  Spain,  —  and  then  to 
commence  the  publication  of  the  Gospel  at  the  ex- 
tremity of  Western  Europe."  *  Previous,  however, 
to  putting  this  plan  into  execution,  he  had  arranged 
to  visit  once  more  the  Churches  of  Greece,  with  the 
twofold  view  of  counterworking  the  disturbing  in- 
fluences which,  from  speculative  philosophy  on  the 
one  hand,  and  from  Jewish  superstitions  on  the  other, 
had  destroyed  the  Unity  of  the  Gospel  Spirit,  and 
of  furthering  by  his  presence  their  benevolent  inten- 

*  Neander. 
21  * 


246  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tions  for  the  afflicted  Church  at  Jerusalem.  It  would 
appear,  as  we  shall  find  when  we  come  to  the  Second 
Epistle,  that,  in  some  previous  message  or  Letter,  he 
had  promised  the  Corinthians,  that  on  his  way  to 
Macedonia  he  would  pass  from  Ephesus  to  Corinth, 
instead  of  taking  the  more  direct  course  through 
Asia  Minor,  and  that  on  his  return  from  Macedonia 
he  would  come  to  Corinth  again  on  his  way  to  Pales- 
tine. The  first  part  of  this  intention,  however,  he 
abandoned,  through  a  tender  reluctance  to  meet  the 
Church  immediately  after  a  necessity  had  arisen  for 
the  severe  censures  of  this  Epistle,  —  and  an  extreme 
unwillingness  that  any  personal  intercourse  should 
take  place  in  a  moment  of  irritation  or  estrangement. 
In  such  a  moment  the  passions  may  precipitate  the 
better  nature  into  strife,  —  the  fatal  position  may  be 
taken  from  which  there  is  no  after  retreating,  —  and 
the  golden  bridge  of  reconciliation  be  for  ever  broken 
down.  It  was  certainly  in  the  wisdon  of  Love  that 
St.  Paul  avoided  Corinth  at  such  a  time.  ^This 
change  of  purpose,  however,  as  we  shall  find  in  the 
Second  Epistle,  his  enemies  there  attributed  to  the 
vacillating  spirit  of  the  man,  and  converted  into  a 
new  pretext  for  disrespect.  This  alteration  of  plan 
he  now  announces.  You  will  remember  that  this 
Epistle  was  written,  not  from  Philippi,  as  the  Post- 
script in  our  English  Bibles  affirms,  but  at  Ephesus, 
in  the  year  a.  d.  56,  and  about  the  time  of  the  Jew- 
ish Passover.  "  Now  I  will  come  unto  you  when  I 
shall  pass  through  Macedonia,  for  I  do  pass  through 
Macedonia.  And  it  may  be  that  I  shall  abide,  yea, 
and  winter  with  you,  that  ye  may  bring  me  on  my 


L  COR.  CHAP.    XVI.  247 

journey  whithersoever  I  go.  I  shall  not  therefore 
(as  I  formerly  intended)  see  ye  now  on  my  journey, 
—  but  I  hope  rather  to  abide  with  you  a  long  time, 
if  the  Lord  permit.  But  I  will  remain  at  Ephesus 
until  Pentecost :  for  a  great  and  effectual  door  is 
'  opened  unto  me,  and  there  are  many  adversaries." 
The  number,  and  the  activity,  of  adversaries  are  no 
signs  that  a  good  cause  is  languishing,  but  rather 
the  contrary.  It  is  when  you  are  suffered  to  live 
at  peace,  that  you  may  fear  you  are  exerting  little 
influence  in  the  world,  that  you  are  disturbing  no 
cherished  prejudice,  alarming  no  established  error. 
St.  Paul  connects  the  opening  of  the  "  great  and 
effectual  door  "  with  desperate  efforts  on  the  part  of 
the  enemies  of  Truth  and  God  for  the  preservation 
of  their  own  Kingdom.  The  more  widely  the  door 
of  the  Gospel  was  thrown  open,  and  the  Ephesians, 
deserting  the  Idol  altars,  crowded  the  strait  gates  of 
Evangelical  Life,  the  more  would  those  who  were 
connected  with  the  secular  interests  of  the  Estab- 
lished Religions  be  excited  to  active  hostility.  It  was 
very  shortly  after  this  passage  was  written,  that  a  vi- 
olent popular  outrage  took  place  at  Ephesus  against 
St.  Paul,  —  an  unquestionable  evidence  of  the  suc- 
cess of  his  ministry.  In  the  record,  in  the  nineteenth 
chapter  of  the  Acts,  the  progress  of  the  Gospel,  and 
the  popular  commotion  against  it,  are  brought  into 
immediate  juxtaposition :  "  So  mightily  grew  the 
word  of  God  and  prevailed.  After  these  things, 
Paul  purposed  in  the  spirit,  when  he  had  passed 
through  Macedonia  and  Achaia,  to  go  to  Jerusalem, 
saying,  After  I  have  been  there,  I  must  also  see  Rome. 


248  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

So  he  sent  into  Macedonia  two  of  them  that  n:iinis- 
tered  unto  him,  Timotheus  and  Erastus ;  but  he 
himself  stayed  in  Asia  for  a  season.  And  the  same 
time  there  arose  no  small  stir  about  that  way.  For 
a  certain  man  named  Demetrius,  a  silversmith, 
which  made  silver  shrines  for  Diana,  brought  no 
small  gain  unto  the  craftsmen,  —  whom  he  called 
together  with  the  workmen  of  like  occupation,  and 
said,  '  Sirs,  ye  know  that  by  this  craft  we  have  our 
wealth.  Yet  ye  see  and  hear,  that  not  alone  at 
Ephesus,  but  almost  throughout  all  Asia,  this  Paul 
hath  persuaded  and  turned  away  much  people,  say- 
ing, that  there  are  no  gods  which  are  made  with 
hands ;  —  so  that  there  is  not  only  danger  that  this 
our  craft  should  be  brought  into  contempt,  but  also 
that  the  temple  of  the  great  goddess  Diana  should  be 
despised,  and  her  magnificence  should  be  destroyed, 
whom  all  Asia  and  the  World  worshippeth.'  And 
when  they  heard  these  words,  they  were  full  of 
wrath,  and  cried  out,  saying,  '  Great  is  Diana  of  the 
Ephesians.' "  * 

In  this  passage  mention  is  made  of  Timothy  be- 
ing sent  to  the  Churches  in  Macedonia,  the  Church- 
es of  Philippi  and  Thessalonica,  —  and  in  the  tenth 
verse  of  this  Chapter,  without  any  notice  of  the 
Macedonian  journey,  we  find  an  expectation  on  the 
part  of  St.  Paul  of  his  probable  arrival  at  Corinth, 
This  is  one  of  those  undesigned  coincidences  be- 
tween independent  writings,  which  afford  the  strong- 
est moral  proof  of  the  authenticity  of  both,  —  the 
coincidence  being  of  such  a  nature  that  it  escapes 

*  Actsxix.  20-28. 

V 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  249 

rather  than  courts  observation.  St.  Paul  had  ex- 
pected Timothy  to  arrive  in  Corinth  after  this  Epis- 
tle had  been  received,  and  so  to  be  able  to  convey  to 
him  the  impression  it  had  produced.  Nothing  can 
be  keener  than  the  anxiety  he  manifests  upon  this 
subject.  "  I  had  no  rest  in  my  spirit,"  is  his  lan- 
guage. In  this  expectation  of  intelligence,  however, 
he  was  disappointed,  as  Timothy,  owing  to  some 
detention  in  Macedonia,  was  obliged  to  return  to 
Ephesus  without  visiting  Corinth  at  all.  These  cir- 
cumstances are  not  without  their  interest,  as  they 
exhibit  St.  Paul  subject  to  the  casualties,  the  disap- 
pointments, the  erroneous  calculations,  which  disturb 
the  arrangements  of  every  life,  and  which  discipline 
the  spirit  and  the  temper  to  be  ever  ready  to  aban- 
don preconceived  plans  in  order  to  make  the  best 
use  of  the  unexpected  exigencies  that  God  may  send. 
"  That  man  appoints,  but  God  disappoints,"  is  a 
saying  that  is  true  only  because  man  lingers  with 
his  own  plans,  and  wants  readiness  of  mind  to  fol- 
low God's  beckonings,  —  else  might  he  find  in  every 
case  that  God's  disappointments  are  better  than 
Man's  appointments. 

In  this  passage  there  is  another  expression,  which 
Paley,  in  his  admirable  work  on  this  description  of 
evidence,  has  singled  out  as  one  of  those  undesigned 
coincidences  which  establish  beyond  dispute  the  gen- 
uineness and  simplicity  of  a  wTiter.  "  Now  if  Tim- 
othy come,  see  that  he  may  be  among  you  without 
fear,  —  for  he  worketh  the  work  of  the  Lord,  even 
as  I  myself  do.  Let  no  one  therefore  despise  him." 
"  Why  despise  him  ?     This  charge  is  not  given  con- 


250  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

cerning  any  other  messenger  whom  St.  Paul  sent ; 
and,  in  the  different  Epistles,  many  such  messengers 
are  mentioned.  But  turn  to  1  Tim.  iv.  12,  and  you 
will  find  that  Timothy  was  a  young  man^  —  younger, 
probably,  than  those  who  were  usually  employed  in 
the  Christian  mission,  and  that  St.  Paul,  apprehend- 
ing lest,  on  that  account,  he  should  be  exposed  to 
contempt,  urges  upon  him  the  caution  which  is  there 
inserted,  —  '  Let  no  man  despise  thy  youth.'  " 

It  is  satisfactory  to  find  from  the  twelfth  verse  that 
ApoUos,  who,  probably  not  with  his  own  consent, 
had  been  made  the  nominal  Leader  of  one  of  the 
philosophical  parties  at  Corinth  which  introduced 
speculative  distinctions  into  the  simplicity  of  the 
Gospel,  had  followed  St.  Paul  to  Ephesus,  and  was 
then  acting  in  intimate  union  with  him.  There  is 
no  proof,  indeed,  that  this  eminent  man,  however  in- 
clined by  education  and  mental  peculiarities  to  the 
Oriental  Philosophy,  had  ever  sought  to  ingraft  it 
on  the  spiritual  elements  of  Christianity,  —  or  to 
add  it  on  to  the  Foundation,  —  the  genuine  accept- 
ance by  the  heart  of  Jesus  Christ  as  the  moral  Sav- 
iour and  Guide  to  God.  It  would  appear,  indeed, 
that  he  left  Corinth  and  followed  St.  Paul  to  Eph- 
esus, because  he  was  unwilling  to  be  identified  with 
any  sectarian  party  in  the  Church, —  and  that  he  de- 
clined returning,  even  at  the  instigation  of  the  Apos- 
tle, because  he  knew  that  the  seeds  of  party  division 
were  still  alive,  and  that  his  name  and  influence 
would  be  abused  by  those  who  ostentatiously,  and 
factiously,  preferred  the  speculative  and  rhetorical 
expositions  of  Religion  which  the  Alexandrian  had 


I.    COR.    CHAP.    XVI.  251 

derived  from  his  birth  and  education,  to  the  un- 
adorned moral  preaching  of  the  Power  that  was  in 
the  Life  and  Cross  of  Christ,  by  the  Evangelical  St. 
Paul.  "  As  for  our  brother  ApoUos,  I  greatly  en- 
treated him  to  go  to  you  with  the  brethren :  but  he 
was  by  no  means  willing  to  go  at  that  time,  —  but  he 
will  go  when  he  shall  have  a  convenient  season." 

The  thirteenth  verse  contains,  in  one  sentence,  an 
exhortation  to  the  love  and  pursuit  of  those  spiritual 
virtues,  which  their  condition  and  their  dangers  most 
urgently  required.  Their  condition,  as  w^e  have  seen, 
was  one  of  disunion,  growing  out  of  a  neglect  of 
the  simple  principle  of  the  Gospel  Salvation,  the 
acceptance  of  Jesus  by  the  affections  as  the  Image 
of  God,  the  inspirer  and  pattern  of  the  spiritual  life 
in  man.  This  simple  love  and  imitation  of  the 
Lord  Jesus,  the  source  of  unity  and  bond  of  peace, 
was  deserted  for  every  favorite  tendency  of  super- 
stition or  philosophy  that  prejudice  or  education  had 
introduced  into  the  various  minds,  gathered  out  of 
every  nation,  that  met  at  Corinth,  —  and  the  result 
was  a  struggle  of  conflicting  Individualities,  each 
claiming  to  stamp  itsplf  upon  the  Gospel,  and  to  be 
essential  to  Christianity,  instead  of  resorting  to  it  as 
a  common  fountain  of  Life,  —  a  fountain  open  to 
all  who  thirst  for  living  water,  whatever  may  be  the 
diversity  in  outward  form  of  their  mental  and  na- 
tional peculiarities.  There  was  the  Grecian  type  of 
mind,  which  would  exalt  knowledge  above  simple 
Trust  in  God  and  in  his  Christ,  and  would  insist 
that  every  thing  in  Religion  should  be  reduced  to  a 
scientific  form  ;  —  there  was  the  Jewish  cast  of  spirit, 


252  FIRST    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

imperfectly  emancipated  from  days,  and  meats,  and 
feasts;  —  there  was  the  impetuous  imitator  of  St. 
Paul,  without  fully  comprehending  his  wise  and 
tender  spirit,  who  to  show  his  freedom  rushed  into 
indecent  excesses,  sat  down  to  meat  in  the  Idol's 
temple  to  display  his  philosophic  indifference  to  out- 
ward things,  and  tempted,  by  the  rudeness  of  his 
liberty,  the  weak  brother,  for  whom  Christ  died,  to 
sin  against  his  conscience;  —  there  was  the  Chris- 
tian woman  whom  the  Gospel  had  elevated  to  the 
full  dignity  of  human  nature,  in  the  first  flush  of  ex- 
citement overstepping  for  a  moment  the  modesty 
of  nature  ;  —  and  lastly,  there  was  the  natural  man, 
unchastened  by  the  Gospel,  eager,  with  a  childish 
vanity,  for  the  most  ostentatious  display  of  spiritual 
Gifts,  and  more  set  on  self-exaltation  than  on  the 
edification  of  the  Church.  Among  these,  —  the  pre- 
sumptuous,—  the  exalter  of  speculation  above  sim- 
ple faith, —  the  childish  rhapsodist  who  used  his 
spiritual  gifts  for  purposes  of  vanity,  —  the  weak, 
the  scrupulous,  and  the  formalist, — the  hard  and 
proud  sciolist,  who  would  stand  upon  his  abstract 
knowledge  and  concede  nothing  to  the  infirmity  of 
a  brother;  —  among  these,  how  aptly  are  distributed 
the  several  clauses  of  the  condensed  exhortation,  — 
"  Watch  ye,  —  stand  fast  in  the  faiths  —  behave  like 
men,  —  be  strong,  —  let  all  things  among  you  be 
done  in  Love  I " 

St.  Paul  did  not  write  his  Epistles  with  his  own 
hand.  He  dictated  to  an  amanuensis,  and  authen- 
ticated the  letter  by  a  few  words  at  the  close  in  his 
own  writing.     This  was  rendered  necessary  by  the 


I.    COR.    CHAP.   XVI.  253 

appearance  of  forged  Letters  by  those  who  wished 
to  give  currency,  and  the  sanction  of  authoritative 
names,  to  their  own  favorite  views,  even  in  that  ear- 
ly period  in  the  Church,  so  falsely  represented  as 
pure.  Of  one  of  these  forgeries  in  his  own  name, 
St.  Paul  complains  in  the  Second  Epistle  to  the 
Thessalonians.  The  autograph  by  which  he  authen- 
ticated his  Letters,  was  generally  some  weighty  sen- 
tence, suggested  by  the  occasion  and  the  thoughts 
he  had  been  expressing,  —  with  the  Salutation  of 
Christian  affection.  In  the  present  case,  it  is  the 
appropriate  sentiment,  going  to  the  root  of  their  di- 
visions :  "  If  any  man  love  not  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  —  let  him  not  belong  to  the  Church  "  ;  — 
closing  with  the  Syriac  words,  "  Maran-atha,  —  the 
Lord  is  coming." 

The  distress  occasioned  by  these  words  to  some 
Unitarian  commentators,*  as  if  they  contained  a  de- 
nunciation which  the  spirit  of  Christ  would  not  jus- 
tify, is  entirely  factitious,  arising  out  of  a  false  inter- 
pretation :  "  Let  him  be  accursed  :  The  Lord  is  com- 
ing." Yet  would  w^e  rather  be  identified  with  those 
venerable  men,  who,  believing  it  to  be  a  denunciation, 
true  to  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  had  the  courage  to  condemn 
it  even  in  an  Apostle, — than  with  those  dogmatic 
interpreters  who  also  believe  it  to-be  a  denunciation, 
but,  false  to  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  seize  upon  it  with  a 
furious  eagerness,  —  rejoice  in  it  and  justify  it,  — in- 
flame by  it  their  religious  passions,  —  and  defend  by 
its  authority  a  temper  and  a  spirit  which  the  Gospel 
never  breathed.     Better  to  belive  Paul  wrong,  than 

*  See  Belsham  on  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul,  at  this  place. 
22 


254  FIRST   EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

to  believe  Jesus  intolerant, —but  better  still  to  find 
Paul  and  Jesus  one  in  Wisdom  and  in  Love.  And 
this  communion  with  the  Catholic  Spirit  of  the 
Lord,  St.  Paul  claims  for  himself;  —  and  with  the 
expression  of  it  closes  his  Epistle.  "  The  grace  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  be  with  you !  My  Love  be 
with  you  all  in  Christ  Jesus.  —  Amen." 


THE    SECOND   ETISTLE   TO 
THE   CORINTHIANS. 


PART  I . 

(chaps.    I. -VII.) 

ADMONITIONS, 
AND  EXPLANATIONS  OF  SPIRITUAL  CHRISTIANITY, 

ADDRESSED  CHIEFLY 

TO  THAT  PORTION  OF  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH 

WHOSE  AFFECTIONS,  BY  HIS  FIRST  EPISTLE, 

WERE  REGAINED   TO  PAUL. 


SECOND   EPISTLE   TO   THE 
COEINTHIANS* 


PART  I. 

(chapters     I. -VII.) 


SECTION    I. 


WHICH  ENABLED  HIM  TO  IMPART  THE  PEACE  WHICH  HE 
FOUND  :  FELLOWSHIP  IN  SUFFERING  FOR  A  HOLY  CAUSE 
SHOULD  SHIELD  FROM  MISCONSTRUCTION  :  PAUL's  EXPLA- 
NATION OF    HIS  DEFERRED  VISIT  TO  CORINTH. 


CHAPS.   I.    1-24  — II.  1-4. 

I.  1.  Paul,  by  the  will  of  God  an  Apostle  of  Jesus  Christ, 
and  Timothy  our  brother,  to  the  Church  of  God  that 
is  in   Corinth,  along  with  all  the  Saints  that  are  in   all 

2  Achaia,  Grace  and  Peace  be  to  you,  from  God  our  Fa- 
ther, and  from  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 


♦  "Written  from  Macedonia  about  a.  d.  57. 
22* 


258  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

3  Blessed  be  the  God  and  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  the  Father  of  mercies,  and  the  God  of  all  con- 

4  solation,  who  comforteth  us  in  all  our  tribulation  that  we 
may  be  able  to  comfort  those  who  are  in  any  trouble  by 
the   comfort   wherewith  we  ourselves  are  comforted  by 

5  God.    For  as  the  sufferings  of  Christ  abound  in  us,  so  also 

6  through  Christ  aboundeth  our  consolation.  And  if  we 
are  afflicted,  it  is  for  your  consolation  and  salvation ;  if 
we  are  comforted,  it  is  for  your  consolation,  putting  forth 
its  energy  in  the  endurance  of  the  same  sufferings  which 

7  we  also  suffer.  And  our  hope  for  you  is  steadfast,  know- 
ing that,  as  ye  are  partakers  of  the  sufferings,  so  will  ye  be 

8  of  the  consolation.  For,  brethren,  we  would  not  have  you 
ignorant  of  our  affliction  which  befell  us  in  Asia,  that  out 
of  measure  we  were  pressed  beyond  our  strength,  so  that 

9  we  despaired  even  of  life.  But  we  had  the  sentence 
of  death  in  ourselves,  that  we  might  not  trust  in  ourselves, 

10  but  in  that  God  who  raiseth  the  dead  :  who  from  so  great 
a  death  delivered  us,  and  doth  deliver ;  in  whom  we  have 

11  placed  our  hope  that  he  will  yet  deliver  us  ;  —  ye  also 
working  together  for  us  in  prayer,  that  the  blessing  upon 
us  out  of  many  supplications  may  be  acknowledged  in 
thanksgiving  for  us  by  many. 

12  For  our  rejoicing  is  this,  the  testimony  of  our  Con- 
science, that  in  simplicity  and  godly  sincerity,  not  in  flesh- 
ly wisdom,  but  in  the  grace  of  God,  we  have  had  our  con- 
versation in  the  world,  and  more  especially  towards  you. 

13  For  we  write  to  you  no  other  things  than  those  which  ye 
read  and  recognize  [we  have  no  ambiguous  or  disguised 

14  meanings]  :  and  I  trust  ye  will  recognize  completely,  as 
in  part  ye  have  recognized  us,  —  that  we  are  your  glory- 

15  ing,  as  ye  also  ours  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  And 
in  this  confidence  I  at  first  purposed  to  go  to  you  that  ye 

16  might  have  a  second  benefit,  both  to  pass  through  you 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  259 

into  Macedonia,  and  again  to  go  to  you  from  Macedonia, 

17  and  to  be  sent  forward  by  you  towards  Judea.  When  I 
purposed  this,  did  I  then  practise  any  levity  ?  Or  in  the 
things  that  I  purpose,  do  I  purpose  after  a  fleshly  con- 
venience, that  with  me  there   should  be  Yea  yea,  and 

18  Nay   nay  ?     But  God   is  faithful  ;  because  our  word  to 

19  you  was  not  made  Yea  and  Nay.  For  the  Son  of  God, 
Jesus  Christ,  who  was  preached  among  you  by  us,  by 
me  and  Silvanus  *  and  Timothy,  was  not  made  Nay  and 

20  Yea,  but  in  him  Yea  has  been,  for  all  the  promises  of 
God  in  him  are  Yea,  and  in  him  Amen,  unto  the  glory 

21  of  God  through  us.     And   he  who  establisheth  us  with 

22  you  in  Christ,  and  hath  anointed  us,  is  God  ;  who  hath 
also  sealed  us,  and   given  us  the  earnest  of  the  spirit  in 

23  our  hearts.     And  I  call  God  as  a  witness  for  my  soul, 

24  that  to  spare  you  I  came  not  yet  to  Corinth.  Not  that 
we  have  dominion  over  your  faith,  but  we  are  fellow- 
helpers  of  your  joy  :  for  by  faith  ye  stand. 

II.  1.     But  I  determined  this  with  myself,  that  I  would  not 

2  come  again  to  you  in  grief.  For  if  I  grieve  you,  who 
then  is  there  to  make  me  glad  hvti  he  who  is  grieved  by 

3  me  ?  And  I  have  written  to  you  this  very  thing,  that  in 
coming  I  should  not  have  grief  from  those  in  whom  I 
ought  to  rejoice,  having  confidence  in  you  all  that  my  joy 

4  is  the  joy  of  you  all.  For  out  of  much  affliction  and  an- 
guish of  heart  I  wrote  unto  you  with  many  tears,  not  that 
ye  should  be  grieved,  but  that  ye  might  know  the  love 
which  I  have  more  abundantly  towards  you. 


About   the  year  a.  d.  56,  and  five  years  after  his 
first  introduction  of  the    Gospel   among  them,   St. 

*  Probably  Silas;  Acts  xv.  40;  xvi.  19;  vii.  14. 


260  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Paul  had  occasion  to  write  the  former  of  his  Epis- 
tles to  the  Corinthians.  In  that  time  the  original 
impression  both  of  the  Preacher  and  his  Doctrine 
was,  no  doubt,  weakened.  The  local  elements  of 
character,  temper,  and  philosophy  had  space  to  de- 
velop themselves  within  the  bosom  of  the  Church, 
—  if  not  to  the  extent  of  destroying  the  Gospel  prin- 
ciples, at  least  so  far  as  to  confuse  and  neutralize 
their  power.  In  this  strife  of  passion  and  prejudice, 
where  the  Greek,  the  Oriental,  the  Jew,  and  the  nat- 
ural Man  unchastened  by  the  Gospel,  each  gave 
way  to  his  own  predominating  tendency,  and  palmed 
it  on  Christianity,  St.  Paul  tried  the  effect  of  an  ar- 
gumentative and  expostulatory  Letter,  restating  the 
original  principles  of  the  Doctrine  of  Jesus,  and  ex- 
hibiting the  spiritual  Unity  which  might  exist  in  the 
midst  of  the  freest  development  of  individual  pecu- 
liarities, if  only  the  heart  was  right,  if  only  Love 
was  present,  and  undue  selfishness  restrained.  That 
Letter,  as  we  have  seen,  was  not  harsh  in  tone,  and 
much  less  was  it  authoritative  or  dictatorial.  But 
it  dealt  with  great  evils,  having  their  roots  in  un- 
chastened passions ;  —  and  with  such  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  deal  faithfully,  and  run  no  risk  of  offence. 
The  Letter  was  tender,  yet  severe ;  for  it  was  one  of 
those  cases  where  Truth  itself  is  severity,  and  Ten- 
derness is  but  a  balm  upon  the  wound. 

The  result  of  this  argument  and  expostulation 
was  a  doubtful  matter,  —  as  in  such  cases  it  always 
is.  It  is  imposvsible  to  interfere  in  the  concerns  of 
another's  well-being,  and  especially  if  the  assump- 
tion is  that  you  deem  yourself  to  be  interfering  from 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  261 

higher  ground,  without  incurring  the  danger  of  ag- 
gravating the  evil,  by  awakening  the  bitterness  of 
some  of  the  deepest  passions  that  lurk  in  the  self- 
love  of  man.  St.  Paul,  than  whom  no  man  under- 
stood better  the  Rights  of  another's  mind,  and  the 
irritabilities  of  Self-love,  awaited  at  Ephesus  in  ex- 
treme anxiety  for  tidings  of  the  reception,  and  ef- 
fects, of  the  First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians.  This, 
anxiety  manifests  itself  in  several  characteristic  par- 
ticulars. In  the  first  place,  previous  to  the  despatch 
of  the  Epistle,  Timothy,  who  was  then  on  a  mission 
to  the  Churches  of  Macedonia,  had  directions  to  be 
at  Corinth  about  the  time  of  the  Letter's  arrival, 
that  with  the  least  possible  delay  he  might  report 
its  effect  upon  the  angry  elements  of  that  divided 
Church.  This  project  failed,  however,  from  some 
cause  of  detention  of  which  we  are  not  informed. 
Secondly,  —  no  sooner  was  the  failure  of  this  chan- 
nel of  intelligence  known  to  St.  Paul,  than  he  sent 
Titus,*  an  express  messenger  to  Corinth,  with  direc- 
tions that  he  should  rejoin  him  at  Troas.  Thither 
he  had  fled  from  Ephesus,  driven  out  by  popular  vio- 
lence excited  by  the  craftsmen  whom  the  prevailing 
Idolatry  employed;!  —  ^^^  there  he  awaited  that 
information  from  Corinth  which  was  to  shape  his 
future  course.  Not  in  inaction,  however,  though  in 
the  restlessness  of  spirit  characteristic  of  moral  anx- 
iety, did  he  remain  at  Troas :  he  relieved  his  spirit 
by  doing  his  Master's  work,  —  and  in  his  own  strik- 
ing language,   "  a  great  door  was  opened  unto  him 

*  This  statement  is  only  conjectural :  it  is  Neander's  view. 
t  Acts  xix.  23. 


262  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

by  the  Lord."  Still  Titus  returned  not,  and  Paul, 
impatient  of  delay,  left  the  work  that  was  prosper- 
ing in  his  hands,  and  with  troubled  feelings  crossed 
the  northern  part  of  the  JEgean  Sea  into  Macedonia, 
and  at  Philippi  received  at  length  from  Titus  the  in- 
telligence he  had  so  eagerly  looked  for.  It  was, 
upon  the  whole,  of  a  nature  to  allay  his  solicitudes. 
The  former  bonds  of  personal  attachment  and  spir- 
itual sentiment  were  drawn  again  with  a  fresh  pow-. 
er,  —  and  the  larger  and  better  part  of  the  Church 
were  awakened  to  deep  shame  for  the  abuses  that 
had  been  suffered  to  live  within  their  bosom.  This 
anxiety  for  the  result  of  his  faithful  and  bold  expos- 
tulation,—  this  tenderness  of  apprehension  in  a  na- 
ture so  lofty  in  its  enthusiasm,  and  the  relief  it  ex- 
perienced when  he  heard  of  the  better  feelings  ex- 
cited among  them,  —  is  related  by  St.  Paul  himself 
in  the  seventh  chapter  of  this  Epistle,  in  a  manner 
that  needs  no  comment,  and  will  bear  no  paraphrase : 
"  When  we  had  come  into  Macedonia,  our  flesh  Jiad 
no  rest ;  we  were  troubled  on  every  side ;  wdthout 
were  conflicts,  within  were  fears.  Nevertheless  God, 
who  comforteth  those  that  are  cast  down,  comforted 
us  by  the  coming  of  Titus,  and  by  the  consolation 
wherewith  he  had  been  comforted  in  you,  when  he 
told  us  your  earnest  desire,  your  mourning,  your  fer- 
vent mind  towards  me,  —  so  that  I  rejoiced  the  more. 
For  if  I  grieved  you  by  my  Epistle,  I  do  not  repent ; 
though  indeed  I  did  repent:  —  for  I  perceive  that 
the  same  Epistle  grieved  you,  but  for  a  season. 
Now  I  rejoice,  not  that  ye  were  grieved,  but  that  ye 
sorrowed  to  repentance :  for  ye  were  grieved  after  a 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II. 


263 


godly  manner,  so  that  ye  have  received  no  injury  by 
us  in  any  respect ;  —  for  godly  sorrow  worketh  re- 
pentance to  salvation,  not  to  be  repented  of:  but  the 
sorrow  of  the  world  worketh  death.  Behold  now 
this  very  sorrowing  by  you  after  a  godly  manner, 
what  carefulness  it  wrought  in  you ;  yea,  what  clear- 
ing of  yourselves  ;  yea,  what  indignation  ;  yea,  what 
fear ;  yea,  what  vehement  desire  ;  yea,  what  zeal ; 
yea,  what  vindication  I  In  all  things  ye  have  shown 
yourselves  to  be  now  clear  in  this  matter.  —  On 
this  account  we  were  comforted  by  reason  of  your 
comfort:  yea,  and  we  the  more  abundantly  re- 
joiced for  the  joy  of  Titus,  because  his  spirit  was 
refreshed  by  you  all.  For  in  whatsoever  I  have 
gloried  to  him  concerning  you,  I  have  not  been 
put  to  shame;  but  as  we  spake  all  things  to  you 
in  truth,  even  so  our  glorying  concerning  you  to 
Titus  is  found  to  be  a  truth :  and  his  tender  affec- 
tion is  more  abundant  toward  you,  whilst  he  remem- 
bereth  the  obedience  of  you  all,  —  how  ye  received 
him  with  fear  and  trembling.  I  rejoice  that  I  have 
now  confidence  in  you  in  all  things." 

This  rejoicing,  however,  was  not  unmixed.  Those 
more  directly  implicated  in  the  dissensions  and  lax- 
ity of  the  Church  were  not  humbled,  but  embittered 
by  reproof ;  —  and,  galled  by  the  submission  of  the 
majority,  they  set  themselves  to  sow  suspicions,  and, 
by  misinterpretation  of  words  and  actions,  to  un- 
dermine the  influence  of  the  Apostle.  They  said, 
"  that  he  was  powerful  only  in  his  Letters,  but  that 
his  bodily  presence  was  weak,  and  his  speech  con- 
temptible "  ;  —  "  that  he  was  conscious  of  this  weak- 


264        SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

ness,  and  therefore  was  always  threatening  to  come, 
but  never  came; — ^that  from  this  consciousness 
arose  the  vacillation  of  purpose  which  led  him  to 
change  his  intention  of  an  immediate  visit  to  Cor- 
inth ;  —  that  thus  doubtful  of  purpose  and  ambigu- 
ous in  expression,  if  such  was  his  character,  such 
would  be  his  teachings " ;  —  and  finally,  that  the 
Christian  affection  and  prudence  which  led  him,  in 
perfect  simplicity  of  intention,  to  address  himself 
to  a  spiritual  sympathy  in  whatever  connection  it 
might  be  found,  "  was  but  a  mixture  of  interest  and 
artifice,  making  him  all  things  to  all  men,  not  for 
their  berJefit,  but  for  his  own." 

Under  the  influence  of  the  mixed  feelings  pro- 
duced by  such  intelligence,  St.  Paul  wrote,  from 
Macedonia,  his  Second  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians : 
and  it  breathes  of  this  twofold  sentiment,  —  of  an 
affection,  full  and  fervent,  as  if  it  would  identify  it- 
self with  the  whole  Church  at  Corinth,  —  and  of  a 
self-respect  that  vindicated  his  conduct  and  reputa- 
tion, with  a  vehemence  of  spirit  not  disproportioned 
to  the  grcEttness  of  the  outrage.  It  blends  the  ut- 
most conciliation  with  a  spirit  that  will  abate  noth- 
ing of  personal  Dignity  and  Rights.  It  is  a  mixture 
of  conciliation  and  defence,  —  where  the  Defence  is 
not  the  apology  of  conscious  weakness,  but  the  self- 
vindication  of  insulted  strength. 

It  is  remarkable  how  any  earnest  direction  of  the 
mind  will  color  and  shape  the  whole  form  of  a  com- 
munication, even  in  those  parts  and  particulars  of  it 
which  would  seem  to  have  the  most  remote  connec- 
tion with  the  strong  purpose  of  the  writer.     This  is 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  265 

the  hidden  source  of  that  fine  unity,  which  makes 
common  natures  sensible  of  the  depth  and  power 
that  belong  to  a  genuine  mind.  You  are  never 
loose  from  the  grasp  of  their  strong  purpose,  even 
in  those  manifestations  of  themselves  when  it  is 
not  directly  brought  before  you.  The  undertone  of  , 
their  moral  feeling  sounds  out  through  all  their  va- 
ried voices,  just  as  the  gentlest  ripple  and  murmur 
of  the  sea  is  still  the  play  and  whisper  of  a  vast  and 
awful  Power.  From  such  natures,  the  less  earnest 
minds,  who  love  to  float,  without  any  direct  aim,  on 
the  stream  and  current  of  affairs,  are  apt  to  feel,  not 
without  antipathy,  that  there  is  no  escape.  "Whether 
they  urge  their  purpose  directly,  or  seem  to  cast 
their  nets  more  widely,  you  become  sensible  that 
the  same  powerful  influences  are  hemming  you  in, 
and  closing  around  you ;  and  not  unfrequently  the 
injustice  is  committed  of  attributing  to  Art  and  deep- 
laid  Design  this  moral  Unity  of  bearing  and  impres- 
sion, which  is  in  fact  nothing  more  than  the  uncon- 
scious betrayal  of  the  ruling  sentiment  of  an  ear- 
nest mind.  Art  may  teach  those  who  have  no  ear- 
nestness of  nature,  how  a  semblance  of  Unity  may 
be  communicated  to  the  productions  of  the  mind; 
but  the  deeply  moved  soul  cannot  do  otherwise  than 
breathe,  and  speak,  and  act,  in  Unity  of  feeling, — 
and  those  whose  feebler  sympathies  are  strained  by 
such  sustained  exertion,  are  not  unapt  to  suspect 
that  there  is  design  and  stratagem  where  there  is 
only  pure  singleness  of  soul.  Thus  great  Philan- 
thropists are  very  apt  to  be  called  Mannerists^  by 
those  whose  sympathies   are  soon   exhausted   and 

23 


266         SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHTANS. 

tired.  Continued  and  constant  purpose  is  soon 
voted  to  be  a  wearisome  reiteration  ;  —  and  the  man 
whose  Christian  impulse  and  affection  is  as  fresh  to- 
morrow as  to-day,  —  as  ready  to  urge  its  claims 
anew,  till  all  its  objects  are  accomplished,  —  is  selfish- 
ly dismissed  as  a  man  of  one  Idea.  Such  are  the  ar- 
tifices, by  which  the  colder  protect  themselves  against 
the  more  earnest  hearts.  Their  feebler  moral  nature 
gets  no  rest  under  these  stronger  souls.  Such  gen- 
uine minds  are  the  tests  how  far  the  faith  and  spirit 
that  are  professed  by  a  community  are  real  and  op- 
erating influences  ;  and  whilst,  often,  they  create  a 
saving  shame  and  a  new  faithfulness  in  honest 
hearts,  —  they  are,  also,  often  maligned  and  violent- 
ly repelled  from  the  sympathies  of  those  who  have 
no  thoroughness  of  nature,  and  who  love  nothing  on 
earth  so  much  as  to  feel  no  responsibilities,  and  to 
live  at  ease.  Of  such  stimulating  earnestness  was 
the  spirit,  and  mission,  of  St.  Paul ;  — and  it  is  the 
explanation  of  how  one  of  such  fulness  of  sympa- 
thies, so  ready  to  adapt  himself  to  any  true  element 
of  the  religious  mind,  had  yet  depredators  and  per- 
sonal enemies.  We  can  well  believe  that,  without 
designing  it,  he  would  be  a  thorn  in  the  side  of  those 
partial  receivers  of  a  Principle,  who  professed  to 
adopt  the  spiritual  view  of  Salvation,  the  safety  of 
the  soul  through  moral  union  with  the  Christ  of  God, 
and  yet  nullified  it  by  still  continuing  their  reliance 
on  the  religion  of  Rite  and  of  Observance ;  or  of 
those  who  avowed  the  Christian  doctrine  of  Mercy 
and  Holiness,  without  feeling  the  daily  impulses  of 
a  merciful  and  heavenly  Nature,  —  and  who,  to  use 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  267 

his  own  words,  named  the  name  of  Jesus  without 
departing  from  iniquity.  His  enemies  at  Corinth 
were  of  one  or  other  of  those  classes  who  made 
some  addition  of  philosophy,  or  of  ceremony,  to  the 
doctrine  of  the  Salvation  of  the  soul  by  its  spiritual 
union  with  God  through  the  attraction  of  his  Christ, 
—  or  who,  professing  to  have  died  unto  Sin,  and  to 
have  risen  to  a  new  life  with  Christ,  were  still  under 
a  voluntary  subjection  to  infirmity  and  evil  passion. 
But  to  return  to  that  Unity  of  impression  which, 
proceeding  from  the  simplicity  of  an  earnest  nature, 
produces  the  effect  of  the  most  consummate  Art, — 
we  have  an  evidence  of  it,  even  in  the  forms  of 
those  thanksgivings  to  God  which  make  the  usual 
introductions  of  St.  Paul's  Epistles.  In  the  first 
words,  what  the  Prophets  call  "  the  burden  "  of  the 
heart  is  unconsciously  communicated.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  whole  is  hidden  in  the  sentiment  of  the 
opening  sentence.  In  his  First  Letter  to  the  Corin- 
thians, his  object  was  to  extinguish  the  feeling  that 
there  could  be  any  essential  difference  in  those 
whom  a  true  discipleship  in  Christ  made  one,  and 
accordingly  his  thanksgiving  to  God  is  for  this  fel- 
lowship of  spirit:  —  "I  thank  my  God  always  on 
your  account,  for  the  grace  of  God,  —  which  hath 
been  given  you  in  Christ  Jesus  ;  that  ye  have  been 
enriched  in  him,  in  every  thing,  in  all  utterance  and 
all  knowledge,  —  even  as  the  testimony  concerning 
Christ  was  confirmed  among  you :  so  that  ye  are 
deficient  in  no  gift,  —  looking  for  the  coming  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  —  who  will  also  establish  you 
blameless  unto  the  end.     God  is  faithful,  by  whom 


268         SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

ye  have  been  called  unto  the  fellowship  of  his  Son 
Jesus  Christ  our  Lord."  In  this  Second  Epistle,  his 
object  is  to  draw  close  the  bonds  of  spiritual  rela- 
tionship between  himself  and  the  Corinthians,  and 
to  make  it  felt  that  the  admonitions  which  had 
shamed  some,  and  irritated  others,  were  but  the  ten- 
der ligaments  of  this  sacred  connection ;  for  that  all 
self-love,  or  wounded  self-esteem,  must  disappear  in 
a  spiritual  friendship ;  —  and  accordingly,  his  thanks- 
giving to  God  is  for  that  Christian  experience  which 
enabled  him  to  enter  with  sympathy  and  understand- 
ing into  the  trials  and  consolations  of  another's  mind  : 
"  Blessed  be  God,  even  the  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  the  Father  of  mercies  and  the  God  of  all  con- 
solations, who  comforteth  us  in  all  our  tribulation, 
that  we  may  be  able  to  comfort  those  who  are  in 
any  trouble,  by  the  consolation  wherewith  we  our- 
selves are  comforted  in  God."  The  world  knows  no 
connection  of  hearts  so  intimate  as  that  which  unites 
those  who  are  suffering  together  for  a  holy  cause. 
That  supreme  interest,  exposed  to  peril,  breaks  down 
for  the  time  all  individual  isolation,  and  gives  to  the 
most  distant  participator  a  brother's  right  of  counsel, 
admonition,  and  reproof;  —  and  the  consolations  that 
arise  out  of  such  noble  trials  are  common  property, 
not  thoroughly  enjoyed,  as  not  righteously  used, 
until  they  have  been  dispensed  to  fellow-sufferers 
who  stand  in  need  of  their  supports.  St.  Paul 
blesses  God,  that  in  a  righteous  cause  he  had  sound- 
ed the  depths  of  trial,  that  the  peace  of  God  which 
he  had  found  there,  the  purest  springs  of  living 
waters  in  the  lowest  depths,  he  might  be  able  to  com- 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  269 

municate  to  others  who  had  to  tread  the  same  ways 
of  discipline.  There  is  no  secret  of  a  blessed  Life 
than  this,  —  to  be  carried  out  of  the  poverty  and 
weariness  of  self-regards  in  pursuance  of  great  ends, 
and  to  feel  that  every  ray  of  encouragement  and 
light  which  God  lets  fall  upon  that  Christian  path, 
is  an  invitation  from  the  Father  of  Mercies  to  share 
with  his  other  children  its  joy  and  consolation.  It  is 
not  that  suffering  is  the  best  influence  for  character ; 
—  for  happiness,  and  community  in  happiness,  is  the 
element  in  which  our  moral  natures  breathe  most 
purely  and  most  generously,  —  in  which  we  are  most 
devout,  patient,  and  self-forgetting ;  —  but  then  the 
happiness  which  produces  such  fruits  must  be  de- 
rived from  noble  sources,  —  it  must  be  the  fragrance 
and  incense  of  pure  and  heavenly  sentiments,  —  it 
must  arise  to  us,  involuntarily,  out  of  God's  presence 
with  fidelity  in  hardships,  as  the  Peace  that  passeth 
understanding;  and  as  there  is  no  condition  so  pro- 
ductive of  this  blessedness,  as  the  conquest  of  those 
difficulties  that  lie  in  the  path  of  every  lofty  aim,  it 
has  hence  arisen  that  sore  trial  and  discipline  have 
been  so  constantly  associated  with  the  well-being 
of  Man.  Yet  is  it  not  suffering-^  but  the  holy  joy 
that  arises  in  a  faithful  soul,  the  peace  of  dutiful 
affections,  that  constitutes  its  atmosphere  of  healthy 
and  of  saving  sentiment.  This  indeed  is  the  view 
which  St.  Paul  here  gives  of  the  connection  of  suf- 
ferings with  right  and  blessed  states  of  the  moral 
affections :  —  "  for  as  the  sufferings  of  Christ  abound 
in  us,  so  our  consolation  also  aboundeth  through 
Christ,"  —  in  proportion   as  the  spirit  of  Christ,  re- 

23* 


270  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

vived  in  us,  by  obliging  us  to  take  his  path,  exposes 
us  to  his  sufferings,  does  it  also  fill  us  with  the 
blessedness  of  those  true  affections  to  which  God 
has  enabled  us  to  be  faithful. 

This  fellowship  St.  Paul  claims  with  the  Corin- 
thians,—  and  he  claims  also,  though  not  in  direct 
words,  that  it  should  extend  to  him  their  confidence 
in  whatever  part  of  his  conduct  and  character  he 
might  for  a  moment  be  subject  to  a  misconstruction. 
This  indeed  was  the  object  for  which  he  brought  it 
forward.  It  was  one  of  those  indirect  defences  of 
the  Heart,  in  which  the  evidence  of  the  course  and 
objects  of  a  whole  Life,  the  devotion  and  faithful- 
ness of  the  long  Past,  —  ought  to  make  misunder- 
standings impossible,  and  to  shame  distrust.  He 
had  not  lived  to  himself,  —  he  had  suffered  in  their 
behalf.  But  the  benefit  was  mutual ;  —  no  man  can 
do  good  to  others  without  blessing  himself,  and  he 
asked  only  that  the  spiritual  advantages  to  both, 
wrought  out  by  him,  should  bind  them  together  in 
Christian  confidence  and  love:  "  Whether  we  are  af- 
flicted, it  has  been  for  your  salvation,  for  it  has  come 
to  us  in  the  ministry  of  the  Gospel;  —  and  if  we 
are  comforted,  we  have  made  you  also  participators 
in  our  consolations,  for  your  own  patient  enduring 
of  such  sufferings,  —  both  when  they  befall  yourselves, 
and  when  they  reach  you  through  your  sympathy 
with  us." 

Having  thus  alluded  to  his  sufferings  in  their 
behalf  as  the  foundation  of  an  intimate  spiritual 
relationship  between  them,  with  great  tenderness  and 
generosity  of  sentiment  he  proceeds  to   place  that 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    I.,    II.  271 

union  on  the  grounds  of  an  equality  of  service,  by 
attributing  his  deliverance  to  their  spiritual  interest 
in  him,  and  the  influence  of  their  prayers:  —  "  We 
had  the  sentence  of  death  in  ourselves,  and  were 
but  waiting  for  its  execution,  —  but  it  was  only 
that  we  might  learn  to  trust  in  that  God  who  rais- 
eth  the  dead,  who  delivered  us  from  so  great  a  death, 
—  you  also  working  together  for  us  in  prayer,  that 
the  blessing  which  the  intercessions  of  many  obtained, 
the  thanksgivings  of  many  may  acknowledge." 

We  must  not  do  more  than  allude  in  passing  to 
this  subject,  of  the  efficacy  of  the  Prayer  of  inter- 
cession. It  has  its  difficulties,  if  we  assume  to  pen- 
etrate the  philosophy  of  God's  connections  with 
Man ;  but  perhaps  not  more  so  than  the  influence 
of  strictly  individual  Prayer.  A  wise  and  holy 
heart  will  be  as  careful  in  asking  blessings  for  it- 
self as  for  others,  not  to  substitute  its  own  provi- 
dence, or  apprehension  of  what  might  be  good,  for 
the  providence  of  God,  — not  to  ask  God  to  save  us 
from  the  hours  of  His  ordaining,  in  which  our  souls 
are  troubled,  —  nor  to  let  pass,  without  our  drinking 
of  it,  the  cup  which  His  hand  extends ;  —  but  with 
these  restrictions,  which  apply  to  all  filial  appli- 
cations to  God,  it  is  as  natural,  as  irrepressible,  a 
movement  of  the  religious  mind,  to  recommend  oth- 
ers to  the  Heavenly  help  and  love,  as  to  recommend 
ourselves,  —  to  set  before  us  in  our  prayers  those 
whom  we  cannot  aid,  in  the  spiritual  light  of  God's 
almighty  protection, — to  comfort  our  human  per- 
turbations by  bearing  them  on  our  hearts  to  Him, 
and  leaving  them  with  Him  ;  —  and  both  Faith  and 


272  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORIxNTHIANS. 

Reason  can  perceive  how  blessings  and  consolations, 
the  answers  to  such  prayers,  may  belong  to  hearts 
thus  spiritually  united,  which  cannot  be  given  to 
those  who  remember  self  only  in  their  prayers,  and 
do  not  feel  daily  that  every  human  affection  reposes 
in  the  faithfulness  of  our  Father's  Providence  and 
Love.  Who  will  say  to  what  extent  another's 
prayers,  and  spiritual  interest  in  our  welfare,  might, 
through  our  relations  with  their  hearts,  affect  our 
destinies,  without  implying  any  variableness  in  the 
purposes  of  God  ? 

This  intimate  spiritual  relationship  between  St. 
Paul  and  the  Corinthians  won  for  him  an  affection- 
ate confidence  from  the  larger  and  better  part  of  the 
Church  ;  —  and  as  for  that  part  of  it  which  misunder- 
stood and  misinterpreted  him,  —  it  is  a  small  thing 
for  one  who  lives  in  the  sight  of  God,  and  under 
the  constant  sense  of  Omniscient  introspection,  to 
be  judged  by  man's  judgment.  No  good  man  makes 
light  of  the  opinion  of  another ;  —  but  the  soul's 
peace  depends  not  on  human  breath,  and  the  deep 
fountains  of  our  self-respect  cannot  be  greatly  troubled, 
when  the  clear  waters  lie  open  to  the  eye  of  God. 
"  My  rejoicing  is  this,  the  testimony  of  my  con- 
science, that  in  simplicity  and  godly  sincerity,  not  in 
carnal  wisdom,  but  in  the  grace  of  God,  we  have  had 
our  intercourse  with  the  world,  and  especially  towards 
you."  The  worldly  prudence  and  departure  from  sim- 
plicity attributed  to  him  was,  that,  from  some  motives 
not  creditable  to  his  self-reliance  and  courage,  he  had 
shrunk  from  the  fulfilment  of  an  avowed  intention, 
interpreted  as  a  promise,  of  an  immediate  visit  to 


II.    COR.   CHAPS.    I.,   II.  273 

Corinth  in  its  contentious  condition.  He  meets  the 
charge,  as  any  man,  however  high,  ought  to  meet 
such  a  charge,  when  it  is  openly  made,  — first,  by  an 
unequivocal  assertion  of  his  innocence ;  secondly,  by 
giving  the  true  explanation  of  the  misrepresented 
conduct ;  and  lastly,  if  his  life  and  character  entitle 
him  to  it,  by  a  statement  of  such  circumstances  in 
relation  to  himself  as  ought  to  have  protected  him 
from  any  man's  suspicion :  "  Having  thus  purposed, 
did  I  use  any  lightness  ?  or  do  I,  in  the  things  that 
I  purpose,  follow  worldly  inclination  and  convenience, 
so  that  with  me  there  should  be  yea,  and  nay  ?  As 
God  is  faithful,  my  word  toward  you  was  not  yea, 
and  nay." 

"  Moreover,  I  call  God  for  a  witness  upon  my  soul, 
that  it  was  to  spare  you  I  came  not  as  yet  unto 
Corinth,  —  not  that  we  claim  any  dominion  over 
your  faith,  for  in  the  faith  Christ  has  made  you  free, 
but  that  we  would  be  fellow-helpers  of  your  joy." 
"  I  therefore  determined  that  I  would  not  come 
again  to  you  to  bring  grief,"  —  and  "  for  that  cause 
I  wrote  to  you  out  of  much  affliction  and  anguish  of 
heart  with  many  tears,  —  not  that  ye  should  be 
grieved,  but  that  ye  might  know  the  abundant  love 
which  I  have  for  you." 

"  And  lastly,  the  Master  whom  I  serve,  not  without 
such  evidences  of  faithfulness  as  sacrifice  and  suffer- 
ing may  give,  —  the  Master  whose  own  mission  in 
the  world  was  to  be  true,  and  to  bear  witness  to  the 
Truth,  —  in  whom  also  the  promises  of  his  Father 
are  so  fulfilled  that  he  is  'the  Amen  and  true  wit- 
ness to    God,' — and  the    God   who  has    wrought 


274  SECOND   EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

through  me,  —  and  sealed  my  ministry  by  his  own 
Power,  and  given  me  the  earnest  of  his  spirit,  which 
through  me  ye  also  have  received,  ought  to  have 
been  my  sacred  protection  against  the  levity  and  in- 
justice of  evil  thoughts." 

"  No  man, "  said  Jesus,  "  who  shall  do  a  miracle 
in  my  name,  can  lightly  speak  evil  of  me."  * 

"  No  man,"  implies  St.  Paul,  "  who  has  received 
a  spiritual  blessing  at  my  hands,  in  whose  service 
God  has  used  me  as  His  instrument,  should  lightly 
conceive  evil  of  me." 

*  Mark  ix.  39. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,   III.  275 


SECTION    II. 

ST.  Paul's  restoration  of  the  penitent  sinner.  —  the 

SAL'^TION  OF  forgiveness. —  HIS  THANKFULNESS  THAT 
THE  GOSPEL  LIGHT  HAD  BROUGHT  HEALING  AND  REPENT- 
ANCE, AND  NOT  AGGRAVATED  SIN.  — SIMPLE  TRUTHFULNESS 
HIS  ONLY  COMPETENCY  FOR  A  SAFE  ADMINISTRATION  OF 
god's    TRUTH.  LETTER    AND    SPIRIT. 


CHAPS.  II.  5  17  — III.  1-18. 

II.  5.  But  if  a  certain  person  hath  caused  grief,  he  hath 
grieved  not  me,  but  in  part  you,  that  I  may  not  press  up- 

6  on  you  all.     Sufficient  to  such  an  one  was  that  punish- 

7  ment,  from  the  majority ;  so  that,  now,  ye  ought  rather 
to  forgive  and  comfort,  lest  such  an  one  be  swallowed  up 

8  by  overmuch  grief.     Wherefore  I  beseech  you  to  give 

9  full  force  to  your  love  towards  him.  For  to  this  end  also 
I  wrote,  that  I  might  know  this  proof  of  you,  if  ye  are 

10  obedient  in  all  things.  And  to  whom  ye  forgive  any 
thing,  I  forgive  also  :  for  if  I  have  forgiven  any  thing,  I 
have  forgiven  it  for  your  sakes,  in  the  sight  of  Christ, 

11  that  we  may  not  be  overreached  by  Satan,  for  we  are 
not  ignorant  of  his  devices. 

12  And  when  I  came  to  Troas,  to  preach  the  Gospel  of 

13  Christ,  and  a  door  was  opened  to  me  in  the  Lord,  I  had 
no  rest  in  my  spirit,  on  not  finding  Titus  my  brother,  — 
but  taking  my  leave  of  them  I  went  from  thence  into 
Macedonia. 


276  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

14  Now  thanks  be  to  God  who  always  cause th  us  to  tri- 
umph  in   Christ,   and  maketh  manifest  the  odor  of  the 

15  knowledge  of  Himself,  through  us,  in  every  place  !  For 
we  are  to  God  a  sweet  odor  of  Christ  in  those  who  are 

16  saving,  and  in  those  who  are  losing  themselves ;  in  the 
one  the  odor  of  death  unto  death,  and  in  the  other  the 
odor  of  life   unto  life.     And  who   is  adequate   to   these 

17  things  ?  For  we  are  not  as  the  many  who  make  a  traffic 
of  the  Word  of  God  ;  but  as  out  of  sincerity,  as  from 
God,  before  the  face  of  God,  we  speak  in  Christ. 

III.  1.  Are  we  beginning  again  to  recommend  ourselves  ? 
Or  do  we  need,  as  do  some,  recommendatory  letters  to 

2  you,  or  recommendatory  letters  from  you  ?  Ye  your- 
selves are  our  Epistle,  written  in  our  hearts,  known  and 

3  read  by  all  men,  manifestly  shown  to  be  the  Epistle  of 
Christ,  administered  by  us,  written  not  with  ink,  but  with 
the  spirit  of  the  living  God,  not  on  tablets  of  stone,  but  on 

4  the  fleshly  tablets  of  the  heart.     And  we  have  this  con- 

5  fidence  through  Christ  in  God  ;  not  that  we  are  adequate 
of  ourselves  to  reckon  on  any  thing,  as  from  ourselves, 

6  but  our  adequacy  is  from  God,  —  who  hath  made  us  com- 
petent ministers  of  the  New  Covenant,  not  of  the  letter, 
but  of  the  spirit ;  for  the  letter  killeth,  and  the  spirit  mak- 

7  eth  alive.  And  if  the  administration  of  death,  in  the 
letter,  engraven  on  stones,  was  made  in  glory,  so  that 
the  children  of  Israel  could  not  steadfastly  look  upon  the 
face  of  Moses  for  th©  glory  of  his  countenance,  a  glory 

8  that  was  to  be  done  away,  —  how  shall  not  the  adminis- 

9  tration  of  the  spirit  be  more  glorious  ?  For  if  the  ad- 
ministration of  condemnation  was  glorious,  much  more 
doth  the  administration  of  justification  abound  in  glory. 

10  For  even  that  which  was  made  glorious  is  not  glorious  in 

11  this  relation,  because  of  the  glory  that  excelleth.     For  if 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  ,  277 

that  which  is  done  away  was  with  glory,  much   more 
that  which  abideth  is  in  glory. 

12  Having  then  such   Hope,  we  use  great   freedom  of 

13  speech  ;  and  not  as  Moses,  who  put  a  veil  over  his  face, 
that  the  children  of  Israel  could  not  steadfastly  look  to 

14  the  end  [the  final  object]  of  that  which  is  abolished  :  but 
their  minds  were  blinded,  for  until  this  day  remains  the 
same  veil,  in  their  reading  of  the  Old  Testament,  not  yet 

15  lifted  off  because  it  is  done  away  in  Christ.  But  until 
this  day,  when  Moses  is  read,  the  veil  lies  upon  their  heart. 

16  But  when  it  shall  turn  to  the  Lord,  the  veil  shall  be  taken 

17  away.     Now  the  Lord  is  that  spirit,  and  where  the  spirit 

18  of  the  Lord  is,  there  is  Liberty.  And  we  all  with  un- 
veiled face,  beholding  as  in  a  glass  the  glory  of  the  Lord, 
are  transfigured  into  the  same  image  from  glory  to  glory, 
as  from  a  Lord  who  is  Spirit. 


In  the  fifth  chapter  of  his  First  Epistle,  St.  Paul 
had  ordered  a  Corinthian  convert  who  had  formed 
an  incestuous  connection  to  be  openly  separated 
from  the  Church ;  both  that  the  cause  of  Christian- 
ity should  not  suffer  by  the  immorality  of  professors 
who  had  no  practical  fellowship  with  it,  —  and  that 
the  guilty  individual,  tainted  perhaps  by  the  rotten 
fruit  of  some  unholy  speculation  on  Morals,  rather 
than  a  conscious  violator  of  God's  Laws,  should  be 
awakened  to  reflection  and  self-knowledge  by  this 
act  of  righteous  discipline.  The  Kingdom  of  God 
on  Earth,  whose  essence  was  Righteousness,  and 
Peace,  and  Joy  in  a  holy  spirit,  would  be  reduced 
to  a  level  with  the  Kingdoms  of  the  World,  and  have 
no   characteristic    excellence   to    sustain    it   on   the 

24 


278  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Earth,  if  impurity  might  show  itself  in  connection 
with  the  profession  of  Christianity.  Heathenism 
was  then  in  possession  of  the  World ;  Corinth  was 
the  head-quarters  of  its  corruption  ;  Christianity  had 
just  raised  the  standard  of  the  Cross  in  connection 
with  Righteousness,  Temperance,  and  a  Judgment 
to  come,  —  the  one  witness  for  a  holy  God  in  the 
midst  of  an  idolatrous  licentiousness  ; —  and  it  would 
be  a  monstrous  and  suicidal  act  to  permit  the  stand- 
ard-bearers of  that  consecrated  Cross  to  be  them- 
selves partakers  of  the  very  impurity  of  manners 
and  soul,  against  which  it  was  the  solitary  protest 
on  the  Earth.  At  all  times  the  professors  of  a 
righteous  cause  are  charged  with  its  destinies  in  the 
world,  —  but  especially  when  the  world  is  strong 
and  adverse,  and  the  righteous  cause  is  but  a  ray  of 
light  that  streaks  the  darkness.  It  was  a  matter  of 
necessity  that  a  man  of  Heathen  heart  and  life  pre- 
suming to  lift  the  standard  of  Holiness  with  foul 
hands,  should  be  disowned  and  excommunicated  by 
the  true  disciples  of  the  Cross.  The  language  in 
which  this  act  of  excommunication  is  advised,  we 
have  already  remarked  upon  in  its  place  in  the 
First  Epistle,  and  its  repetition  now  determines  the 
Scriptural  significance  of  a  very  important  class  of 
words:  —  "For  I  verily,  though  absent  in  the  body, 
yet  present  in  spirit,  have  judged  him  who  hath  so 
done  this  deed,  that  in  the  name  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  ye  do  deliver  up  such  an  one  unto  Satan,  for 
the  extinction  of  the  flesh,  that  the  spirit  may  be 
saved  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  Jesus."  *     The  excom- 

*  1  Cor.  V.  3-5. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  279 

municated  man  was  to  have  his  lot  among  those 
with  whom  he  assimilated  in  spirit  and  in  life :  he 
was  to  take  his  part  with  that  Heathen  World,  which 
was  then  the  Satan,  or  Adversary,  of  God  and  of 
his  Christ.  If,  notwithstanding  his  guilt,  —  which 
might  be  the  consequence  of  his  Heathen  training, 
or  the  foul  fruit  of  some  Antinomian  theory,  and 
not  the  work  and  evidence  of  a  wicked  heart,  —  he 
had  imbibed  any  true  affection,  however  faint,  for 
the  sentiments  of  the  Gospel,  he  would  not  bear 
that  severance  from  its  communion,  that  identifica- 
tion with  its  enemies  ;  he  would  sacrifice  his  pas- 
sions to  his  higher  leadings,  rather  than  utterly  fall 
away  from  Grace,  —  and,  by  the  mortification  of 
his  sensual  will,  renew  his  broken  bond  with  his 
Soul's  Redeemer.  And  so  it  happened.  With 
his  Corinthian  habit  of  mind,  or  through  some 
Gnostic  speculation,  he  had  rather  imperfectly  con- 
ceived the  Christian  Law  of  purity,  than  hardened 
himself  against  it.  His  punishment  brought  con- 
trition, and,  as  would  appear  from  the  terms  applied 
to  it,  that  overwhelming  grief  which  attends  the  first 
thorough  awakening  of  the  heart  to  the  knowledge 
of  deep  evil  within  itself.  The  Church  which  had 
administered  the  discipline  of  the  Apostle,  witness- 
ing his  penitence  and  despair,  now  became  suppli- 
cants for  his  restoration,  and  St.  Paul,  —  well  aware 
that  there  are  tides  of  agonizing  and  penitential  feel- 
ing, which,  "  taken  at  the  flood,  lead  on  "  to  Christian 
sanctification  and  peace,  but  which,  if  suffered  to 
ebb  in  neglect  and  bitterness,  leave  the  heart  harder 
and  drier  than  before,  —  in  the  spirit  of  his  Saviour, 


280  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

and  of  his  Saviour's  God,  would  not  have  those  burn- 
ing tears  needlessly  embittered,  or  that  melted  con- 
science chilled  into  obduracy  by  unforgivingness  and 
scorn.  So  slight,  indeed,  are  the  allusions  to  the  in- 
dividual, that  every  thing  of  personal  infliction  is 
spared,  which  the  delicacy  of  Christian  mercy  could 
suggest.  ^^  Sufficient  to  such  an  one  is  this  punish- 
ment which  he  hath  received  from  many ;  —  so  that 
now  ye  ought  rather  to  forgive  him,  and  comfort  him, 
that  such  an  one  may  not  be  swallowed  up  by  over- 
much sorrow.  Wherefore  I  beseech  you  to  give  full 
force  to  your  love  for  him.  To  whom  ye  forgive 
any  thing,  I  forgive  also  ;  and  indeed  when  we  for- 
give, it  is  as  in  the  spirit  and  person  of  Christ,  lest 
Satan  should  get  an  advantage  over  us,  —  for  we  are 
not  ignorant  of  his  devices."  To  be  unforgiving 
might  be  to  lose  the  moment  of  grace  and  penitence, 
—  to  aid  the  Enemy  of  souls  by  a  sanctimonious 
severity  more  akin  to  human  pride  than  to  God's  ho- 
liness, —  to  stiffen  anew  the  melted  heart,  —  and  to 
cast  again  upon  the  embrace  of  the  world  a  spirit 
that  would  have  abjured  it  for  ever,  if  any  holy  bo- 
som had  been  willing  to  receive  it.  And  whoever 
speaks  of  this  excommuication  by  St.  Paul,  let  him 
tell  the  whole  story,  —  the  vindication  of  Christianity 
from  all  fellowship  with  impurity,  and  also  its  open 
fold  for  the  return  of  penitence. 

St.  Paul  takes  occasion,  as  an  additional  sign 
of  his  spiritual  solicitude  for  the  Corinthian  Church 
in  this  its  unsound  state,  to  mention  his  trepida- 
tion of  mind  as  long  as  he  was  ignorant  how  his 
measures  would  be  received,  and  the   severity  of 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  281 

discipline  affect  the  conscience  of  the  offender  (verses 
12,  13) ;  —  that  so  much  was  his  heart  with  them, 
that  signal  success  elsewhere  in  the  work  of  his 
ministry  —  a  great  door  opened  by  the  Lord  in  Troas 
—  could  not  shut  out  this  leading  anxiety  of  his 
mind ;  and  then,  in  his  most  characteristic  manner? 
he  bursts  into  ardent  thanksgiving,  that,  whether  by 
instant  success,  or  through  temporary  discourage- 
ment and  later  fruit,  God's  power  and  blessing  had 
gone  forth  with  his  Gospel,  and  caused  the  knowl- 
edge of  Himself,  breathed  from  the  lips  of  his  Apos- 
tle, like  a  spiritual  essence,  to  float  upon  the  Gentile 
air.  And  constantly  must  the  inspiration  of  that 
thought  have  been  needed  by  the  man  who,  alone  in 
that  age,  stood  fast  by  the  spirit  and  truth  of  practi- 
cal Christianity,  —  in  other  words,  by  the  inward 
temper  and  reality  of  Religion  ;  and  who  would  not 
adulterate  the  simple  Gospel  to  ward  off  from  him- 
self the  persecution  of  the  various  parties  who  wished 
to  mix  up  with  that  moral  acceptance  of  Christ, 
which  is  the  essence  of  Salvation,  the  ceremonies  of 
the  Jew,  or  the  speculations  of  the  Greek,  or  the  ex- 
travagant pretensions  of  the  independence  of  the 
soul  on  the  body,  the  professed  spiritualism  and  ac- 
tual impurity,  of  the  Mystic.  In  that  age,  when  the 
practical  Reason  of  Mankind  had  no  voice  in  the 
world's  worship,  and  the  whole  sphere  of  Religion 
was  occupied  by  the  two  extremes  of  a  sensual  Su- 
perstition, relying  for  salvation  upon  external  means, 
and  serving  God  through  fear,  and  of  a  mystical 
and  air-drawn  Philosophy,  with  no  more  application 
to  real  spiritual  wants  than  a  sick  man's  dreams, — 

24* 


282  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

what  must  have  been  the  moral  courage  of  the  in- 
trepid Missionary  of  Christ  who,  at  every  step  of  his 
Apostolic  way,  had  to  brave  the  strong  passions  of 
the  alarmed  Fears  of  the  one,  and  of  the  alarmed  Pride 
of  the  other  ;  —  with  the  additional  infliction,  which 
no  heart  could  feel  more  acutely  than  St.  Paul's, 
that  he  was  multiplying  the  responsibilities,  and  ag- 
gravating the  condemnation,  of  those  who  wilfully 
kept  to  their  darkness  because  their  hearts  were  evil, 
—  who  might,  comparatively,  have  had  no  sin  had 
not  light  come  into  their  world,  but  who  had  now  no 
cloak  for  their  sins  !  For  a  man  cannot  hear  a  new 
Truth,  relating  to  his  soul's  health  and  peace,  con- 
vincingly uttered,  —  or  feel  a  movement  of  God's 
spirit  within  his  own,  and  continue,  in  his  Judge's 
sight,  the  same  man  that  he  was  before.  It  is  an- 
other talent  for  which  God  will  reckon  with  him,  — 
a  new  light  upon  the  soul,  or  another  shade  upon 
that  wilful  darkness  which  is  the  dread  sin  against 
the  Holy  Ghost.  Whoever  sheds  abroad  upon  the 
loaded  atmosphere  of  the  world  the  subtle  and  pier- 
cing essence  of  spiritual  Truth,  sends  indeed  the 
breath  of  life  to  some,  but  the  odor  of  condemnation 
and  death,  to  others,  and,  —  to  weigh  the  moral  so- 
licitudes of  such  a  service,  —  against  the  pure  gain 
to  those  who  are  spiritually  saved  by  receiving  the 
good  seed  into  the  good  heart,  must  be  set  the 
aggravated  perishing  of  those  who  quench  the  spirit, 
and  sin  against  knowledge.  "  And  who  is  sufficient 
for  these  things  ?  "  The  man  who  has  trust  in  God 
that  the  Truth  must  be  spoken  whether  it  be  for  sal- 
vation or  for  condemnation,  —  whether  it  be  an  odor 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  283 

of  life  unto  life  in  those  who  are  saved  thereby,  or 
an  odor  of  death  unto  death  in  those  who  wilfully 
perish ;  —  the  man  who,  in  simple  faith  that  God 
knows  the  workings  of  his  spiritual  Instruments,  and 
Himself  gives  us  as  we  are  able  to  bear,  abjures  all 
preparation  of  the  Truth,  all  qualified  dispensing  of 
Principle,  as  a  matter  too  high  for  us,  in  any  sense 
in  which  it  is  not  immeasurably  too  low,  —  and 
which  Omniscience  alone  can  condnct  in  righteous- 
ness and  wisdom  ;  —  the  man  who  "  will  not  corrupt 
the  word  of  God,  but  must  speak  in  Christ,  as  of 
sincerity,  yea  as  of  God,  in  the  sight  of  God." 

This  expression  of  his  confidence,  —  that  God 
requires  every  Steward  of  his  Truth  simply  to  sow 
the  good  seed,  and  accepts  him  according  to  his 
faithfulness,  and  not  according  to  the  fruits,  —  but 
leaves  the  stony  and  barren,  the  volatile  and  worldly 
hearts  to  answer  for  themselves,  —  suggests  to  the 
Apostle's  mind  that  this  might  be  understood  as  a 
comparison  of  himself  with  the  unworthy  arts  of 
some  of  the  Party  Leaders  who  were  his  enemies  at 
Corinth,  and  be  represen,ted  as  breathing  of  that 
self-glory  and  commendation  which,  as  we  know, 
his  Rivals  alleged  was  not  a  little  characteristic  of 
his  temper.  He  alludes  to  the  canvassings  for  pop- 
ularity, the  recommendatory  letters,  and  other  arts  of 
influence,  employed  by  those  who  sought  to  subvert 
his  authority  with  his  own  spiritual  children :  but 
his  letter  of  commendation  to  them  was  within  their 
own  hearts  on  which  he  had  engraved  the  Law  of 
the  spiritual  Gospel,  —  and  they  were  to  the  world 
the  manifest  signs  of  his  Apostleship,  —  a  letter  of 


284  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Christ  in  his  favor  known  and  read  by  all  men  ;  "  not 
written  with  ink,  but  with  the  spirit  of  the  living 
God ;  not  on  tablets  of  stone,  but  on  the  fleshly  tab- 
lets of  the  heart. "  This  was  his  confidence,  and  this 
his  title  to  claim  the  blessing  of  God  on  his  Apostol- 
ic labors,  that  his  sufficiency  to  meet  the  difficulties 
and  perils  of  his  calling  was  not  in  the  skill  with 
which  he  could  adapt  the  simplicity  of  the  Gospel  to 
the  theories  or  the  passions  of  men,  but  in  the  sincerity 
with  which  he  administered  the  unadulterated  word, 
having  trust  in  God  through  Christ,  that  this  alone 
could  work  out  the  spiritual  liberty  of  Mankind,  their 
emancipation  from  the  two  great  evils  of  the  Mind, 
Superstition  and  Sin. 

The  fourth  and  fifth  verses  of  the  third  chapter 
should  be  brought  into  immediate  connection  with 
the  sixteenth  verse  of  the  second  chapter,  what  in- 
tervenes being  incidentally  introduced  :  —  "  "Who  is 
sufficient  for  these  things  ?  Not  he  who  would  ac- 
commodate the  Gospel  to  popular  acceptance  by 
mixtures  of  any  kind,  —  but  he  who  has  trust  in 
Christ,  that,  if  brought  home  in  simple  power  to  the 
hearts  of  men,  he  is  the  saving  spirit  of  the  world : 
and  our  sufficiency  is  of  God,  and  is  summed  up  in 
this,  —  that  we  say  nothing  as  from  ourselves,  but 
are  ministers  of  the  New  Covenant,  without  alloy 
or  addition,  —  not  of  the  letter,  but  of  the  spirit,  for 
the  letter  killeth,  but  the  spirit  giveth  life."  Even  in 
prophetic  times  it  was  recognized  as  the  characteris- 
tic of  a  better  Covenant,  that  it  would  be  a  law  of 
Principle^  —  that  Letter  it  would  have  none,  —  that 
it  would  be  a  Spirit  in  the  souls  of  men,  lifting  them 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  285 

into  communion  with  the  great  Fountain  Spirit,  and 
doing  the  works  of  God  from  faith  and  love.  In- 
deed it  would  be  difficult  to  conceive  a  more  power- 
ful exposition  of  the  spiritual  principle  of  Christian- 
ity than  is  contained  in  the  following  passage  of 
Jeremiah,  not  the  most  evangelical  of  the  Prophets ; 
and  it  shows  how  even  then  the  purer  mind  must 
have  felt  the  bondage  of  the  Law,  and  sighed  for 
that  Law  of  the  spirit  of  Life  in  Christ  which  intro- 
duced the  glorious  liberty  of  the  Sons  of  God :  — 
"  Behold,  the  days  come,  saith  the  Lord,  that  I  will 
make  a  new  Covenant  with  the  house  of  Israel,  and 
with  the  house  of  Judah, — not  according  to  the  Cov- 
enant that  I  made  with  their  fathers  in  the  day  that 
I  took  them  by  the  hand  to  bring  them  out  of  the 
land  of  Egypt,  which  my  Covenant  they  brake,  al- 
though I  was  a  husband  unto  them,  saith  the  Lord : 
But  this  shall  be  the  Covenant  that  I  will  make 
with  the  house  of  Israel :  After  those  days,  saith  the 
Lord,  I  will  put  my  Law  in  their  inward  parts,  and 
write  it  in  their  hearts ;  and  I  will  be  their  God,  and 
they  shall  be  my  people.  And  they  shall  teach  no 
more  every  man  his  neighbor,  and  every  man  his 
brother,  saying,  '  Know  the  Lord,'  for  they  shall  all 
know  Me,  from  the  least  of  them  unto  the  greatest 
of  them,  saith  the  Lord ;  for  I  will  forgive  their  in- 
iquity, and  I  will  remember  their  sin  no  more."  * 
There  could  be  no  juster  description  of  spiritual 
Christianity,  —  the  Law  of  God  written  in  the 
heart,  —  and  the  Spirit  its  own  altar,  its  own  sacri- 

*  Jer.  xxxi.  31-34. 


286  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

fice,  its  own  priest.  It  is  evident  from  the  whole 
tone  of  this  part  of  the  Epistle,  and  the  contrast  it 
exhibits  between  the  Old  and  the  New  Dispensa- 
tion, that  it  was  aimed  at  those  Jewish  obstructers 
of  Gospel  liberty,  whose  minds,  wedded  to  Super- 
stition, and  enfeebled  by  Forms,  had  no  understand- 
ing of  what  was  meant  by  being  "delivered  from 
the  Law  that  we  should  serve  in  newness  of  spirit, 
and  not  in  the  oldness  of  the  Letter."  The  essen- 
tial definition  of  a  Christian  man  is,  that  he  is  one 
to  whose  affections,  to  whose  Love  and  Faith,  God 
and  Christ  are  so  dear  and  so  manifest,  that  he  is 
self-determined  by  his  own  spiritual  nature  in  his 
choice  of  the  Right,  the  Good,  the  Just,  the  True, 
the  Immortal.  He  is  not  under  the  Law,  but  under 
the  Spirit.  His  character  is  the  gushing  of  an  in- 
ward spring,  —  of  a  well  of  water  springing  up  into 
everlasting  life.  There  is  no  outward  bondage  upon 
his  soul ;  in  his  service  to  God  he  knows  no  super- 
stition, and  in  his  service  to  Man  he  feels  no  pres- 
sure of  external  government.  A  divine  affection 
rules  him,  and  he  would  do  the  Right  out  of  his 
own  heart's  love,  self-determined,  though  there  was 
no  outward  Law  in  the  Universe,  and  no  other  wit- 
ness for  God  than  the  voice  of  his  own  spirit.  "  The 
Letter  killeth,  but  the  Spirit  giveth  life."  In  how 
many  senses  does  this  hold  true  I  Forms  and  insti- 
tutions that  grow  not  become  obsolete,  outgrown  by 
the  ever-growing  mind ;  but  the  spirit  which  was 
embodied  in  these  forms  may  find  for  itself  diviner 
expression,  and  breathe  its  inspiration  through  no- 
bler symbols.     Such  is  Civilization.     Its  letter  kill- 


II.    COR.     CHAPS.    II.,    III.  287 

eth,  —  chains  down  the  Future  beneath  the  Past ;  — 
but  its  spirit  breaks  the  bond,  and  freely  moulds  the 
new  forms  of  Life  demanded  by  the  developments 
of  a  progressive  Humanity.  Such  is  Religion.  Its 
Letter  is  a  bondage  ever,  and  in  time  becomes  a 
falsehood;  —  but  its  Spirit  is  undying  and  growing 
Truth,  the  eternal  aliment  of  the  Soul.  What  to 
the  Jews  was  a  full  and  adequate  expression  of  their 
highest  religious  conceptions,  would  not  be  true  to 
the  more  spiritual  forms  of  Christian  Thought :  — 
but  the  spirit  of  the  Old  Testament  rises  again,  with 
a  transcendent  purity,  in  the  New,  —  and  Christian- 
ity, having  no  Letter,  can  never  become  a  bond- 
age, for  its  Law,  as  written  on  the  soul  of  Christ, 
is  daily  promulgated  afresh  from  an  inexhaustible 
spirit.  "  Except  ye  eat  the  flesh  of  the  Son  of  Man, 
and  drink  his  blood,  ye  have  no  life  in  you."  In 
these  words  of  our  Lord  the  Letter  killeth,  and  in- 
deed is  false,  —  but  the  Spirit  opens  to  every  soul 
the  fountains  of  divine  nourishment  to  which  Jesus 
himself  resorted ;  and  accordingly  he  interprets  this 
hard  saying  for  the  misapprehending  Jew :  "  It  is  the 
spirit  that  quickeneth  ;  the  flesh  profiteth  nothing ; 
the  words  that  I  speak  unto  you,  they  are  spirit,  and 
they  are  life."  The  most  scrupulous  exactness  in 
the  attempt  to  conform  to  an  outward  standard  will 
only  deaden  the  soul,  if  there  are  no  consenting  af- 
fections breathing  from  themselves  the  Righteous- 
ness of  God  :  —  and  it  is  a  proverb,  that  the  closest 
observance  of  the  letter  of  a  Law  is  often  the  most 
effectual  way  to  violate  its  spirit.  Neither  is  it  obe- 
dience, but  the  spirit  in  which  it  is  rendered,  the 


288         SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

willing  and  the  loving  heart,  that  hallows  Duty,  — 
just  as,  in  the  daily  intercourses  of  life,  it  is  the  affec- 
tion that  breathes  and  kindles  through  them  which 
gives  them  all  their  value ;  for  if  it  was  absent,  no 
value  would  be  left  to  the  offices  of  kindred  and  of 
home.  Not  to  those  alone  who  pay  the  service  in 
the  deadness  of  outward  exactitude,  but  to  those 
also  who  are  doomed  to  the  bitterness  of  so  receiv- 
ing it,  the  Letter  killeth,  and  only  the  Spirit  giv- 
eth  life.  And  many  are  the  services,  or  even  faint- 
est efforts  at  serving,  ennobled  by  a  spirit  which  this 
world  does  not  limit,  and  all  its  riches  could  not 
duly  reward  ;  many  a  hired  labor  is  performed  with 
a  love  which  the  Universe  could  not  purchase,  and 
which  only  the  Infinite  Source  of  goodness  has  the 
power  worthily  to  acknowledge  and  bless.  The  Let- 
ter, then,  is  the  outward  Law, — the  Spirit  is  its  Sen- 
timent and  Principle.  The  Type  of  the  one  is  in 
the  Commandments  of  Moses,  written  in  letters,  on 
stones  :  Thou  shalt  not  do  this ;  thou  shalt  not  do 
that.  The  Type  of  the  other  is  in  the  Law  of  the 
spirit  of  Life  in  Christ  Jesus,  written  in  Divine 
touches,  and  signatures,  and  impulses,  on  the  Heart: 
"  My  Father  worketh  hitherto,  and  I  work."  And 
where  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  is,  there  alone  is  this 
liberty  of  an  unbound  heart,  acting,  and  feeKng,  out 
of  the  promptings  of  Faith,  serving  God  through 
love,  and  having  no  will  but  His.  He  alone  can,  for 
he  alone  will,  act  like  Christ,  who  has  the  sentiment 
and  the  soul  of  Christ.  It  is  for  the  sake  of  these 
we  must  make  a  study  of  him,  and  hold  continual 
converse  with  his  life,  —  that,  "  beholding  with  open 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    II.,    III.  289 

face  the  glory  of  the  Lord,"  some  of  the  divine  rays 
may  linger  with  us,  so  that  "we  may  be  changed 
into  the  same  image,  from  glory  to  glory,  as  by  a 
Lord  who  is  Spirit."  ♦ 

In  comparison  with  this  Spiritual  dispensation  of 
Grace  and  Truth,  the  distinction  of  the  Jewish  Law 
was  but  as  the  temporary  lustre  that  streamed  from 
the  face  of  Moses  when  he  came  down  from  the 
Mount,  —  a  reflected  and  evanescent  glory.  And 
even  that  brightness,  —  the  kindling  of  a  soul  that' 
had  just  been  elevated  into  communion  with  God, 
making  the  dark  body  the  transparent  medium  of 
the  inward  light,  —  the  dull-souled  people  demanded, 
in  terror,  to  be  veiled  from  their  sight ;  *  and  whilst 
"  Moses  talked  with  the  children  of  Israel,  and  gave 
them  in  commandment  all  that  the  Lord  had  spoken," 
he  kept  a  veil  upon  his  face.  No  unsuitable  emblem, 
suggests  St.  Paul,  of  the  figurative  and  unreal  char- 
acter of  the  Mosaic  Dispensation,  which  revealed 
God  only  by  symbols,  and  was  but  a  shadow  of  good 
things  to  come,  —  the  light  of  His  glory  streaming 
faintly  through  a  veil  of  Forms.  And  still  in  St. 
Paul's  time,  and  until  this  day,  is  it  a  custom  with 
the  Jews  for  the  person  who  reads  the  Law  in  their 
Synagogues  to  put  a  veil  upon  his  face.  A  fitting 
emblem,  again  suggests  the  Apostle,  of  the  veil  that 
is  upon  their  hearts^  so  that,  blinded  by  the  outward 
forms,  they  could  not  see  beyond  the  material  letter, 
nor  penetrate  to  the  vital  and  everlasting  spirit. 
Now,  when  Moses  turned  away  from  the  people, 
and  went  in  again  before  the  Lord,  he  took  the  veil 

*  Exodus  xxxiv.  29,  et  seq. 
25 


290  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

from  his  face ;  and  so,  when  the  Jew  shall  turn  to 
Christ,  the  veil  shall  be  taken  away  from  his  heart, 
and  with  open  face  he  shall  behold  the  glory  of  God, 
not  struggling  darkly  though  emblems,  but  embodied 
in  the  divine  glory  of  His  well-beloved  Son.  For 
the  Lord,  the  divine  and  saving  Christ,  is  the  spirit 
and  highest  result  of  every  Law,  whatever  may  be 
its  Letter.  And  where  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  is, 
there  is  Liberty ;  for  whoever  has  penetrated  to  that 
spiritual  Reality,  to  communion  with  the  living  mind 
of  God's  Son,  and  thence  been  lifted  to  God  Himself, 
has  got  beyond  all  external  veils  in  Religion,  whether 
of  words,  or  forms,  or  creeds,  as  Christ's  spirit  rent 
the  Temple  veil,  and  laid  open  to  all  the  Holy  of 
Holies ;  and  whoever  with  open  face  gazes  on  that 
brightness  of  the  Word  made  Flesh,  of  the  Image 
of  the  Father,  is  "  transfigured  into  the  same  image, 
from  glory  to  glory,  as  by  a  Lord  who  is  spiritual." 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  291 


SECTION  III. 

sensibility  to   human  opinion  ;   its  morality.  pure 

truthfulness    and    pure    love,    the    only    guides 

through    danger   for    an    apostle    of    christ. st. 

Paul's  sole  reliance  on  his  manifestation  of  the 
truth.  —  christ  the  truth  :  the  real  image,  not  a 
figurative  emblem,  nor  an  abstract  theory  of  god. 

the  power   of  faith    in   this   truth   to   renew 

the  inner  man,  and  transfigure  suffering  and 
mortality. 


CHAP.  IV.  1-18. 

1  Wherefore,  having  this  Ministry,  as  we  have  obtained 

2  mercy,  we  faint  not :  but  we  have  renounced  the  conceal- 
ments of  shame,  not  walking  in  craftiness,  nor  adulter- 
ating the  word  of  God,  but  by  manifestation  of  the  Truth 
commending  ourselves  to  all  consciences  of  men,  in  the 

3  sight  of  God.     And  if  our  Gospel  be  veiled,  it  is  veiled 

4  to  those  who  are  losing  themselves ;  among  whom  the  god 
of  this  world  hath  blinded  the  minds  of  the  unbelieving, 
so  that  the  light  of  the  Gospel  of  the  glory  of  Christ,  who 

5  is  the  image  of  God,  doth  not  shine  clearly.  For  we 
preach  not  ourselves,  but  Christ  Jesus  the  Lord,  and  our- 

6  selves  your  servants  for  Jesus'  sake.  For  God,  who  com- 
manded the  light  to  shine  out  of  darkness,  hath  shined  in 
our  hearts,  to  give  the  light  of  the  knowledge  of  the 
glory  of  God,  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ. 

7  But  we  have  this  treasure  in  earthen  vessels,  that  the  ex- 


292  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

cellency  of  the  power  may  be  of  God,  and  not  of  us. 

8  We   are  pressed,  but  not  reduced  to  straits ;  perplexed, 

9  but  not   in  despair ;  persecuted,  but  not  deserted ;   cast 

10  down,  but  not  destroyed  ;  always  bearing  about  in  the  body 
the  killing  of  Jesus,  that  the  life  also  of  Jesus  may  be 

11  made  manifest  in  our  body.  For  we  while  living  are  al- 
ways delivered  unto  death  for  Jesus'  sake,  that  the  life 
also  of  Jesus  may  be  made  manifest  in  our  mortal  flesh. 

12  So  that  death  works  in  us,  but  life  in  you.     And  having 

13  the  same  spirit  of  Faith,  according  as  it  is  written, 
"  I  believed,  and  therefore  have  I  spoken,"  *  we  also  be- 

14  lieve,  and  therefore  speak :  knowing  that  he  who  raised 
up  the  Lord  Jesus,  will  raise  us  up  also  through  Jesus, 

15  and  will  present  us  together  with  you.  For  all  things 
are  for  your  sakes,  that  the  grace  which  hath  abound- 
ed may,  through  the  thanksgiving  of  many,  redound  to 

16  the  glory  of  God.  Wherefore,  we  faint  not ;  but  even 
if  our  outer  man  perish,  yet  the  inner  man  is  renewed 

17  day  by  day.    For  our  present  light  afflictions  work  fpr  us, 

18  ever  exceedingly,  an  eternal  weight  of  glory ;  while  we 
look  not  at  the  things  which  are  seen,  but  at  the  things 
which  are  not  seen :  —  for  the  things  which  are  seen  are 
temporal ;  but  the  things  which  are  not  seen  are  eternal. 


The  love  of  popularity,  a  desire  for  approbation, 
when  made  a  principle  of  Action,  is  perhaps  the 
most  corrupting  and  the  most  disappointing  of  all 
the  affections  of  our  Nature.  It  is  corrupting,  be- 
cause it  turns  the  regards  of  the  mind  in  a  selfish 
direction,  defiles  the  motives  by  substituting  the 
love  of  Praise  for  the  love  of  Praiseworthiness, — 

*  Psalm  cxvi.  10. 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  293 

and  destroys  Truth  and  simplicity  of  Soul  by  intro- 
ducing among  the  inward  sources  of  Life  tempta- 
tions of  a  foreign  and  worldly  character,  that  either 
interfere  with  the  pure  and  natural  movements  of 
the  mind,  —  or  dishonor  and  deform  them  by  bring- 
ing to  their  aid  the  alien  supports  of  selfish  ends.  A 
man  desiring,  on  any  question,  to  see  where  Right 
and  Principle  would  lead  him,  can  no  more  bring 
his  own  accommodation  and  indulgence  into  the 
foreground  of  his  thoughts  without  corrupting  his 
moral  sight,  than  a  man  can  introduce  the  love  of 
commendation  into  the  consultations  of  his  soul, 
without  at  once  insulting  and  silencing  the  divine 
oracle  of  his  spirit.  The  praise  of  God  is  the  only 
Praise  the  love  of  which  can  influence  a  pure  mind ; 
for  there  only  the  two  motives,  the  love  of  approba- 
tion, and  a  supreme  regard  for  the  highest  Truth  of 
the  Conscience,  cannot  .interfere.  We  do  not  say 
that  it  is  the  only  Praise  which,  when  it  comes  as  a 
Reward,  is  pure  or  sweet,  but  that  when  regarded 
as  a  Motive,  as  one  of  the  determining  influences  of 
the  character,  it  is,  for  Adults,  the  only  Praise  that 
is  safe  and  holy.  And  the  desire  for  estimation  is 
disappointing^  as  it  is  defiling.  It  is  one  of  the  ret- 
ributions of  God,  that  if  the  reivards  of  Virtues  are 
suffered  to  occupy  that  place  in  the  affections,  which 
in  a  genuine  and  holy  mind  is  given  only  to  the  Vir- 
tues themselves,  the  self-seeking  becomes  transpar- 
ent, and  the  end  is  lost.  Honor  and  Love  must  fol- 
low us:  we  must  not  follow  them.  If  we  seek  first 
the  Kingdom  of  God  and  His  righteousness,  these 
are  some  of  the  things  w^hich  are  "  added  unto  us." 

25  * 


294  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

But  if  these  secondary  things  become  principal  ob- 
jects with  us,  not  only  will  the  Kingdom  of  God  and 
His  righteousness  never  be  ours,  but  the  very  repu- 
tation or  estimation  to  which  we  made  these  spirit- 
ual things  subservient,  will  flee  from  us ;  —  we  have 
lost  the  charm  of  Grace  and  Truth;  we  are  no  more 
genuine ;  the  hollow  and  selfish  motive  looks  out 
through  the  eager  and  restless  eyes;  the  unconscious- 
ness, the  freedom  from  all  self-reference,  which  is 
the  winning  Power  of  Goodness,  is  brought  into 
contrast  with  the  determined  self-seeking  of  that  ar- 
tificial mind,  —  and  a  character  is  contemplated  with 
which  no  emotion  of  admiration  or  love  can  possi- 
bly coalesce. 

Yet  no  man  with  Christian  affections  can  be  in- 
sensible to  opinion,  or  set  at  defiance  the  approba- 
tion of  those  with  whom  his  life  has  connections. 
To  live  in  opposition  to  those  upon  whom  all  the 
influences  of  our  characters  are  spent,  is  the  next 
saddest  thing  to  living  in  opposition  to  our  own 
hearts.  The  worldly  vanity  that  overrates  estima- 
tion belongs  indeed  to  a  weak  and  low  nature ;  — 
but  there  is  something  dark  and  malignant,  almost 
terrible,  in  the  inhuman  pride  that  can  stand  aloof 
from  sympathy,  and  find  the  regard  of  others  not 
necessary  to  its  peace.  The  commendation  of  our 
fellow-men,  it  would  thus  aftpear,  must  never  enter 
into  our  motives  of  Action,  and  yet  is  necessary  both 
to  the  happiest  states  of  our  hearts,  and  to  the  most 
useful  workings  of  our  characters.  If  we  are  to  do 
good  in  the  world,  there  must  be  a  moral  sympathy 
between  ourselves  and  those  whom  we  bless, —  and 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  295 

yet,  if  we  are  to  do  good  in  the  world,  no  sympathy 
but  a  sympathy  with  God  must  be  permitted  to  in- 
fluence or  determine  the  spirit  of  our  inward  mind. 
These  conditions  can  be  reconciled,  only  as  St.  Paul 
reconciled  them  in  his  relations  towards  the  Corin- 
thians, by  combining  Holiness,  or  Truth  of  Mind^ 
with  a  perfect  disinterestedness  of  the  Affections^  — 
by  seeking  the  Good  of  others,  not  their  Love  or 
Praise,  —  by  desiring  to  be  to  them  a  source  of 
blessedness  for  their  sakes,  not  an  object  of  interest 
for  his  own ;  —  having  confidence  in  God,  that  only 
by  adherence  to  His  Truth  can  any  real  blessing 
be  communicated  to  Man,  and  having  a  generous 
faith  in  Man,  that  those  who  never  accommodate 
themselves  to  Wrong,  nor  corrupt  a  Principle,  will 
have  their  place  of  acknowledgment  among  the  true 
benefactors  of  the  World. 

St.  Paul  had  incurred  the  danger  of  losing  the 
affections  of  the  Corinthian  Church.  Their  religious 
habits,  and  the  make  of  their  minds,  demanded 
that  he  should  permit  them  some  other  spiritual 
supports  than  the  simplicity  of  the  Gospel,  —  some 
other  approach  to  God  than  that  communion  which 
spirit  holds  with  spirit,  —  some  other  and  more  os- 
tensible means  of  Salvation  than  the  inward  puri- 
fication of  the  heart  and  life,  —  some  outward  way 
of  ceremony  which  the  Materialist  might  tread  with 
certainty,  and  make  sure  of  Heaven,  —  or  some 
lofty  and  mystic  Doctrine,  conferring  a  privilege  on 
the  Speculatist  to  scale  its  heights  by  an  intellectual 
path.  In  the  midst  of  the  animosities  excited  by 
the  simple  preaching  of  Jesus  Christ  the  Saviour 


296  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE  CORINTHIANS. 

to  the  opposite  tendencies  of  Greeks  and  Jews,  — 
the  one  diverging  from  practical  Religion  in  the 
direction  of  Superstition,  and  the  other  in  the  direc- 
tion of  Speculation,  —  St.  Paul  committed  himself 
and  his  ministry  to  two  great  Principles :  first,  that 
he  used  no  Instrument  to  open  a  way  to  their  hearts 
but  a  manifestation  of  the  Truth ;  and  secondly, 
that  no  personal  aim  or  selfish  interest  entered  into 
his  ministrations.  The  pure  Truth  of  God,  and  a 
pure  Love  for  those  to  whom  he  preached  it,  made 
the  spiritual  Trusts,  in  the  strength  of  which  he 
cast  his  bread  upon  the  waters.  In  the  first  verse  of 
this  fourth  chapter,  the  expression  of  the  absolute 
confidence  in  which  he  commits  himself  to  the  sim- 
plicity of  the  Gospel,  is  perhaps  obscured  by  the 
phrase  "the  hidden  things  of  dishonesty,"  which 
imperfectly  conveys  the  real  meaning,  namely,  "  that 
he  had  renounced  all  such  concealments  of  the  Truth 
as  result  from  a  want  of  moral  courage."  The  senti- 
ment, and  indeed  the  emphatic  word,  are  the  same 
as  occur  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans  in  a  similar 
connection,  —  "I  am  not  ashamed  of  the  Gospel  of 
Christ."  "  Seeing,  then,"  says  St.  Paul,  "  that  we 
have  received  such  a  ministry,  as  we  have  obtained 
mercy,  we  faint  not  amid  discouragement,  —  but 
have  renounced  the  concealments  of  false  shame,  — 
not  using  artifice  and  management,  nor  adulterating 
the  word  of  God,  —  but  by  manifestation  of  the 
Truth,  commending  ourselves  to  every  man's  Con- 
science in  the  sight  of  God." 

What  was   this    Truth,   the   absolute   possession 
of  which  the  Apostle  thus  confidently  claims?     Is 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  297 

St.  Paul,  after  all,  to  be  reckoned  among  the  Doc- 
trinal leaders,  who  hold  that  some  abstract  Truth 
is  the  salvation  of  Mankind,  —  and  that  its  mani- 
festation to  every  mind  can  be  obstructed  only  by 
the  corruption  of  the  individual  Will  ?  Not  so  :  — 
the  Truth  he  here  speaks  of  has  no  connections 
with  the  speculative  knowledge,  or  the  inferen- 
tial views,  which  never  can  be  entirely  freed  from 
the  uncertainty  that  belongs  to  the  fallibility  of 
the  intellectual  faculty  by  which  they  are  derived. 
Truths  in  relation  to  Christianity,  always  means  in 
Scripture  Spiritual  Reality,  in  opposition  to  the 
shadows,  the  symbols,  the  idols,  in  Lord  Bacon's 
language,  whether  of  the  feelings  or  of  the  intellect, 
which  Mankind  had  substituted  for  divine  Realities 
within  themselves,  —  for  Truth  in  the  inward  parts. 
There  are  many  spiritual  emblems  in  the  Universe, 
many  types  of  God,  many  shadows  of  the  Infinite, 
but  there  is  only  one  thing  that  really  represents 
Him,  and  that  is,  the  soul  and  the  life  of  a  good 
Man ;  —  all  the  rest  are  symbols,  figures,  material 
veils;  but  this  is  a  similitude,  a  divine  Reality,  —  a 
spirit  partaking  of  His  own  nature,  —  not  the  em- 
blem, but  in  some  measure  the  Image  of  God.  So 
also  are  there  many  modes  of  Worship,  —  the  breath- 
ing rite,  the  emblematic  ceremony,  the  temple  ser- 
vice, the  speculative  approach  and  contemplation  ; 
but  there  is  only  one  Worship  that  is  a  Reality,  and 
that  is,  the  reverence,  and  faith,  and  filial  love  that 
fill  the  soul  of  a  good  Man,  —  the  sense  of  God's 
presence,  in  the  power  of  His  personal  character, 
within  the  spirit  of  the  worshipper.     This  was  the 


298  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

sense  which  Christ  attached  to  the  word  Truths  when 
he  explained  to  the  Woman  of  Samaria,  who  was  in- 
quiring of  the  modes  of  external  worship,  —  whether 
on  Zion  or  Gerizim  was  the  service  which  God  pre- 
ferred :  "  God  is  a  spirit,  and  not  to  be  worshipped 
by  emblems  of  any  kind,  but  by  Realities  of  the 
soul,  in  spirit  and  in  truth."  This  was  the  sense 
which  he  attached  to  Truth,  when  he  said,  "  I  am 
the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life,  —  no  man  cometh 
to  the  Father  but  by  me,"  —  for  he  was  the  Reality 
of  that  union  between  God  and  Man,  which  is  the 
new  spiritual  creation,  in  and  for  each  of  us,  which 
Religion  contemplates  as  her  true,  indeed  her  only 
work,  —  and  by  the  realization  of  which  within  the 
individual  soul,  we  can  alone  have  access  to  our 
Father. 

Now,  emblematic,  or  speculative  manifestations 
of  God  will  be  significant  or  not,  according  to  the 
modes  of  conception,  the  habitual  associations,  or  it 
may  be  the  scholastic  training,  of  the  mind  to  which 
they  are  addressed.  To  the  unsusceptible  Imagina- 
tion, or  untrained  Intellect,  the  Emblem  may  be  a 
veil  which  no  light  shines  through,  and  the  specu- 
lative representation  a  cloud  of  words,  which  convey 
no  living  Truth,  —  and  this  attributable  to  no  moral 
defects  in  the  individual,  but  arising  from  the  ac- 
cidents of  education.  But  the  peculiarity  of  that 
manifestation  of  God  which  is  here  called  the  Truth 
is,  that  .being  not  a  dim  emblem,  nor  an  abstract 
speculation,  but  the  very  reality  of  divine  things, 
the  breathing  Image  of  celestial  Love,  Blessedness, 
and    Purity,  it   is  a   direct  appeal  to  the  spiritual 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  299 

nature,  and  cannot  be  rejected  or  unrecognized 
without  implying  the  deadness  and  insensibility  of 
the  moral  affections.  The  worst  thing  that  can  be 
said  of  the  moral  state  of  any  heart  is,  that  it  does 
not  know  the  signs  of  true  Goodness,  when  it  lives 
and  speaks  before  it.  As  face  answers  to  face  in 
water,  so  does  Goodness  imprint  an  image  on  the 
pure  and  ready  mirror  of  a  good  Heart ;  —  and  if 
there  is  no  perception  of  its  presence,  there  is  no  pos- 
sible explanation  but  the  absetice  of  the  assimilat- 
ing affections,  —  that  the  soiled  or  worldly  heart  is 
not  of  a  nature  to  seize  and  reflect  the  rays  of  spir- 
itual beauty.  If  God  gave  us  a  revelation  of  Him- 
self, conveyed,  —  not  in  shadowy  types,  which,  as 
the  emblematic  forms  of  the  material  universe,  are 
only  figurative  representations,  —  nor  in  abstract 
words,  which  express  only  intellectual  conceptions, 
—  but  by  the  actual  manifestation  of  His  own  char- 
acter before  us,  —  if  He  would  withdraw  the  awful 
veil  that  conceals  His  presence,  and  take  us  into 
personal  relations  with  Himself,  —  if  He  would  af- 
ford us  the  opportunity  of  any  real  communication 
with  His  goodness,  —  if  our  Heavenly  Father  would 
but  permit  us  such  means  of  recognizing  the  tender- 
ness of  His  regards  as  make  known  to  us  the  un- 
failing love  of  earthly  parents,  —  if  we  could  know 
what,  in  relation  to  us,  were  the  actual  thoughts  and 
counsels  of  our  Father's  mind,  —  if  but  for  once  the 
eye  of  God  would  look  upon  us,  that  we  might  see 
the  Love  that  beams  in  it,  —  if  but  for  once  we 
could  hear  the  voice  in  which  Infinite  Mercy  would 
speak  to  us :  —  then,  that  would  be  a  Revelation,  un- 


300  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

belief  in  which  would  be  an  absolute  impossibility, 
except  on  the  supposition  that  the  moral  nature  was 
utterly  alienated  from  God,  and  there  was  no  com- 
mon spirit  between  them.  Such  a  manifestation  of 
the  infinite  and  invisible  Father  is  indeed  impossi- 
ble ;  —  nevertheless  the  Revelation  He  has  actually 
given  us  is  of  this  kind.  It  is  a  Revelation  not  by 
emblems,  but  by  Realities;  the  infinite  God  has 
given  us  an  Image  of  Himself;  he  has  projected  all 
the  spiritual  features'  of  His  character  upon  the  soul 
of  Christ,  so  that  he  could  say,  "  He  that  hath  seen 
me  hath  seen  the  Father."  We  cannot  see  the  In- 
finite, but  we  can  see  that  perfect  representation  of 
Him  on  the  scale  of  Humanity,  which  is  the  most 
direct  outward  appeal  that  the  spirit  of  God  can  ad- 
dress to  the  embodied  spirit  of  man.  A  spirit  re- 
flecting the  moral  features  of  God  is  the  nearest  ap- 
proach to  God  Himself,  —  and  a  Revelation  coming 
in  this  form  could  be  rejected  only  by  a  heart  that 
had  deadened,  or  destroyed,  its  natural  affinities  with 
the  Divine  Realities.  It  is  in  this  way  that  St.  Paul 
speaks  of  Christianity,  as  of  a  living  Image  of  God 
presented  to  the  higher  nature  of  man,  so  that,  if 
that  higher  nature  has  any  remaining  life,  it  cannot 
avoid  recognizing  the  Divine  Reality.  "  If  our  Gos- 
pel is  veiled,"  he  says,  "  it  is  veiled  to  them  that  are 
destroying  themselves,  —  to  those  unbelievers  whose 
minds  the  god  of  this  world  hath  blinded,  so  that  the 
light  of  the  glorious  Gospel  of  Christ,  who  is  the 
image  of  God,  cannot  shine  unto  them." 

There  are  two  facts  involved  in  this   Apostolic 
statement:  first,  that  when  not  abused  and  defiled 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  301 

by  worldliness,  the  soul  of  Man  is  naturally  fitted 
to  receive  divine  communications  from  God,  to  rec- 
ognize His  goodness,  and  know  itself  His  child ;  — 
and  secondly,  that  Jesus  Christ,  by  his  perfect  rep- 
resentation of  his  Father's  spirit,  awakens  all  these 
higher  susceptibilities,  and  acts  as  an  instrument  of 
divine  attraction  to  draw  the  Soul  into  spiritual 
union  with  God. 

The  fullest  and '  truest  conception  of  Christianity 
would  be  obtained  by  developing  the  significance  of 
that  description  of  Christ,  which  represents  him  as 
the  Image  of  God.  An  Image  gives  all  the  propor- 
tions of  the  original,  though  upon  a  smaller  scale, 
—  as  when  some  boundless  expanse  of  earth  and 
sky  is  pictured,  in  every  feature,  on  the  smallest 
tissue  of  tender  nerves  within  the  eye.  Thus  when 
Christ  is  called  the  Image  of  God,  it  is  meant  that 
what  God  is  on  the  scale  of  Infinity,  —  that  Christ 
is,  on  the  scale  of  Humanity.  God  possesses  every 
moral  attribute  that  characterized  Jesus,  and  in  the 
same  relations  to  each  other,  —  but  in  an  infinitely 
greater  and  fuller  degree.  The  moral  features  are 
the  same,  —  only,  in  the  one  case,  on  the  scale  of 
created  being,  —  in  the  other,  on  the  scale  of  the 
eternal  and  immeasurable  IVlind.  Thus,  Christ's 
spirit  of  Mercy  is  the  Image  of  God's  Love  ;  Christ's 
Holiness,  of  God's  Holiness;  Christ's  active  Good- 
ness, of  that  Beneficence  which  worketh  ever,  and 
interrupts  its  loving  constancy  by  no  Sabbath  pause ; 
Christ's  union  of  Sinlessness  with  compassion  for 
Sin,  the  image  of  that  Holy  yet  forgiving  Father, 
whose  arms  are  ever  open  to  the  wanderer,  though 

26 


302  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

he  says  to  that  holier  child,  who  strays  and  wanders 
not,  "  Son,  thou  art  ever  with  me,  and  all  that  I  have 
is  thine."  The  divine  light  diffused  through  the 
Universe,  and  in  all  the  workings  of  Providence, 
was  concentrated  within  the  soul,  and  in  the  person, 
of  Christ,  that  he  might  convey  directly  a  representa- 
tion of  God  to  the  soul  of  Man.  "  God,  who  com- 
manded the  light  to  shine  out  of  darkness,  hath 
shined  into  our  hearts,  to  give  the  light  of  the 
knowledge  of  the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus 
Christ."  If,  then,  we  would  know  the  moral  char- 
acter of  God,  we  have  only  to  look  on  the  face  of 
Jesus  Christ,  and  then  lift  our  thoughts  and  hearts  to 
the  Infinite  Original.  If  Christ  was  merciful  to 
man,  —  then  God  is  infinitely  merciful.  If  Christ 
was  forgiving  to  the  penitent,  and  had  no  difficulty 
in  reconciling  his  personal  Holiness  with  the  throb 
of  Mercy,  —  then  God  is  infinitely  compassionate, 
and  his  tenderness  to  the  penitent  is  one  form  of  his 
moral  Perfection.  If  there  was  no  unforgivingness  in 
Christ,  there  can  be  no  unforgivingness  in  God,  —  for 
the  Image  must  be  faithful  to  the  Divine  Original. 
Whatever  moral  feature,  then,  you  find  in  Christ, 
ascribe  it  to  God  with  an  infinite  fulness  ;  —  and 
whatever  moral  feature  you  do  not  find  in  Christ, 
ascribe  it  not  to  God  at  all. 

Such  was  the  Truth  by  the  manifestation  of  which, 
in  its.  simple  purity,  St.  Paul  commended  himself 
to  the  affections  and  consciences  of  the  Corin- 
thians :  it  needed  only  that  it  should  be  preached 
without  mixture  of  personal  objects  or  regard  to 
self,  to  bless  and  justify  its  Apostle.     This  is  the 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  303 

link  of  transition,  that  leads  hinn  to  speak  of  the 
sufferings  which  for  their  sakes  he  willingly  en- 
countered, in  the  preaching  of  this  Gospel :  "  But 
we  have  this  treasure  in  earthen  vessels,  that  the 
excellency  of  the  power  may  be  of  God,  and  not  of 
us."  The  same  faith  in  God,  and  love  for  Man, 
which  had  supported  the  Author  and  Finisher  of 
this  Truth  himself,  must  also  supply  the  inward 
strength  of  its  persecuted  Apostles,  in  the  days  of 
worldly  conflicts,  and  of  martyr  zeal.  Even  the 
Lord  Christ  had  this  spiritual  treasure  in  a  frail  and 
earthen  vessel,  so  that  the  excellency  of  its  power 
was  only  realized  by  a  sustained,  and  sometimes 
struggling,  faith  in  the  invisible  things  of  God.  As 
Jesus  mourned  over  in  dejection,  and  upbraided 
the  cities  wherein  most  of  his  mighty  works  were 
done  because  they  repented  not,  as  though  he  must 
abandon  that  hard  and  thankless  race,  —  and  then, 
revived  by  trust  in  God,  uttered  with  new  and  more 
fervent  tenderness  the  appeal  of  undrooping  Love, 
''  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy- 
laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest " ;  as  he  sunk  into 
trouble  of  soul  under  the  contemplation  of  that  aw- 
ful weight  of  responsibility  which  was  to  press  upon 
his  bowed  and'  suffering  form,  and  in  an  hour  when 
he  would  be  alone  in  the  world,  only  that  his  Fa- 
ther was  with  him,  —  and  then  rose  into  the  light 
of  the  divine  Purpose  that  had  been  clouded  for  a 
brief  moment,  —  "  Yet  for  this  cause  came  I  to  this 
hour :  Father,  glorify,  thy  name  "  ;  as  the  words  of 
the  remembered  Psalm,  learned  in  childhood's  hour, 
fell,  perhaps  half  unconsciously,  from  the  trembling 


304  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

lips  which  agony  had  parted,  —  "  My  God,  why  hast 
thou  forsaken  me  ?  "  and  then,  to  show  that  that  spir- 
it could  not  be  forsaken,  those  lips  closed  for  ever  in 
strains  of  Faith,  — "  It  is  finished  :  Father,  into  thy 
hands  I  commend  my  spirit";  so,  with  all  who 
would  lead  his  life  of  Faith,  and  amid  the  outward 
forms  and  shows  of  things  live  true  to  the  hidden 
spirit  and  secret  purposes  of  God,  the  outward  man 
perishes,  and  the  outward  life  discourages,  and  the 
inner  man  of  faith  and  spiritual  endurance  must  be 
renewed  from  day  to  day,  —  and  only  through  look- 
ing not  to  things  which  are  seen,  but  to  the  things 
which  are  unseen,  if  they  are  pressed  they  are  yet  not 
in  straits,  —  if  they  are  perplexed,  they  are  yet  not 
in  despair,  —  if  they  are  persecuted,  they  are  yet  not 
forsaken,  —  if  they  are  cast  down,  they  are  yet  not 
destroyed,  —  and  that  if  they  bear  about  with  them 
the  suffering  and  the  dying  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  it 
is,  that  in  his  strength,  and  by  God's  blessing,  the 
life  also  of  the  Lord  Jesus  may  in  some  degree  be 
worthily  imitated,  and  represented  in  their  mortal 
frame. 

It  is  remarkable  that  in  this  passage  St.  Paul, 
speaking  of  the  persecution  and  sufferings  he  en- 
dured for  the  sake  of  his  children  in  the  Faith,  uses 
the  very  same  sort  of  language  which,  when  used 
by  the  same  Apostle  in  reference  to  Christ,  a  specu- 
lative Orthodoxy  interprets  into  the  Doctrines  of 
Atonement  and  Vicarious  Death.  He  was  "  con- 
tinually delivered  up  to  death,  that  a  divine  life 
might  be  communicated  to  them  " ;  "  all  his  suffer- 
ings were  for  their  sakes,"  —  "and  death  worked  in 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    IV.  305 

him  that  life  might  work  in  them  " ;  —  he  was  will- 
ing to  meet  affliction  and  death,  if  he  could  only 
thereby  accomplish  his  mission,  and  impregnate 
them  with  Christian  life,  knowing  that  he  who 
raised  up  the  Lord  Jesus  would  raise  up  him  also, 
and  present  him  together  with  those  whom  he  had 
begotten  in  Christ."  Then,  at  least,  would  his 
trust  in  the  Truth,  and  the  Love  in  which  he  ad- 
ministered it,  be  justified  by  God. 

And  the  source   of  all   this   spiritual  confidence, 
and  the  source  too  of  all  the  strength  that  any  spirit 
has,  not  in  sufferings  alone,  but  in  prosperity's  most 
favored   hour,  and  amid  the  bloom  and  life  of  the 
most  blessed  affections,  is  derived  from  that  inward 
eye  which  "  looks  through  the  things  that  are  seen 
and  temporal,  to  the  things   that  are  unseen   and 
eternal."     Affliction,  —  mental  distress, — the  pangs 
of  pain  and  death;  —  these  indeed  may  be  seen  and 
witnessed,  — and  dread  and  awful  they  are ;  yet  when 
most   lingering,  they  pass   like    a   dream,   and    are 
among  the  things  that  are  gone  for  ever;  —  but  the 
unseen  purpose  of  God  into  which  the  spirit  entered 
abides  for  ever,  a  wreath  of  unfading  glory  for  the 
now  sainted  head  of  Meekness   and  patient  Trust. 
And  does  not   Prosperity  itself  require  us  to  enter 
into  the  unseen  spirit  and  purpose  of  God  as  much 
as,  perhaps  even  more  than,  Affliction,  which  brings 
its  own  warnings  and  spiritual  suggestions  with  it  ? 
What,  but  this  blindness  to  the  unseen  purpose  of  the 
spirit  of  God,  turns  many  a  life  of  outward  blessings 
into  the  deepest  miseries  of  a  burdened  existence,  and 
takes  away  that  inward  peace,  that  life  of  the  soul 

26* 


806  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

with  God,  without  which  we  cannot  drink  of  the 
springs  of  joy  that  gush  up  in  our  own  dwellings,  and 
follow  us  in  our  daily  paths  ?  And  who  that  looks 
to  the  Seen,  and  not  to  the  Unseen,  would  dare  to 
encircle  his  heart  with  the  wasting  affections  of  a 
nature  crushed  before  the  moth,  —  with  the  perishable 
ties  of  mortal  Love  ?  No  ;  —  there  is  not  one  sacred 
hour  of  the  Heart's  intercourse  with  others,  in  which 
we  are  not  looking  to,  and  living  upon,  the  unseen. 
The  eye  that  looks  on  us  is  but  the  material  organ 
of  an  unseen  spirit's  Love ;  —  the  familiar  voice  that 
speaks  to  us  draws  its  tones  from  an  unsearchable 
Heart  whose  life  is  hid  with  God  ;  —  the  very  hand 
that  is  clasped  in  ours  has  a  pressure  of  tenderness 
that  belongs  not  to  flesh  and  blood,  and  is  an  im- 
press from  the  unseen  Soul.  Blessed  then  be  God, 
that  they  are  the  Things  that  are  seen  that  are  tem- 
poral, and  the  Things  that  are  unseen  that  are 
everlasting ! 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.  V. -VII.  307 


SECTION    IV. 

THE    TWO    REDEMPTIONS  ;     OF    SOUL,    AND    OF    BODY.  THE 

CHRISTIAN  ON  EARTH   HAS  OBTAINED  THE  ONE,  AND    LOOKS 

FOR   THE    OTHER.  THIS    SPIRITUAL    REDEMPTION    MAKES 

SELF-GLORY     A     SELF-CONTRADICTION,      FOR      TO     LIVE     IN 

CHRIST   IS  TO   BE   DEAD  TO   SELF    AS    CHRIST    WAS    DEAD. 

IN  THIS  LAW  OF  THE  SPIRIT  OF  LIFE  IN  CHRIST  JESUS, 
ST.  PAUL  FINDS  PROTECTION  FOR  THE  CORINTHIANS,  AND 
A  DEFENCE  OF  HIMSELF,  AGAINST  FALSE  TEACHERS  AND 
APOSTLES. 


CHAPS,  v.- VII.  1. 


"V.  1.     For  we  know  that  if  our  earthly  tent-house  were 
dissolved,  we  have   a  mansion  from  God,  a  house  not 

2  built  with  hands,  eternal  in  the  heavens.  And  therefore 
we  sigh,  desiring  to  put  on  over  us  our  house  which  is 

3  from  Heaven ;  if  indeed,  when  putting  it  on,  we  shall  not 

4  be  found  disembodied.  For  we  in  this  tabernacle  do  sigh, 
being  burdened,  not  that  we  desire  to  be  unclothed,  but 
clothed  upon,  that  mortality  may  be  swallowed  up  by  life. 

5  Now  he  that  hath  wrought  us  for  this  selfsame  end  is 
God,  he   who  also  hath  given   to  us  the  pledge  of  His 

6  spirit.  Wherefore,  always  of  good  courage,  and  knowing 
that  when  at  home  in  the  body  we  are  absent  from  the 

7  Lord,  —  for  we  walk  by  Faith,  not  by  sight,  —  we  are  of 

8  good  courage,  and  are  willing  rather  to  be  exiles  from  the 

9  body,  and  to  be  at  home  with  the  Lord.     Therefore  also 


308  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

we  are  zealous,  whether  at  home  or  exiles,  to  be  well 

10  pleasing  to  him.  For  we  must  all  appear  before  the 
judgment-seat  of  Christ,  that  each  may  receive  for  the 
things  that  he  hath  done  in  the  body,  whether  good  or 
evil. 

11  Knowing  therefore  the  terror  of  the  Lord,  we  persuade 
men,  and  are  made  manifest  to  God,  and  I  trust  also  are 

12  made  manifest  in  your  consciences.  For  we  are  not 
recommending  again  ourselves  unto  you,  but  are  giving 
to  you  an  opportunity  of  glorying  on  our  behalf,  that  ye 
may  have  power  against  those  who  glory  in  appearance, 

13  but  not  in  heart.     For  if  we  are  in  an  ecstasy,  it  is  for 

14  God  ;  and  if  we  are  sober-minded,  it  is  for  you.  For  the 
love  of  Christ  constrains  us,  discerning  this,  that  if  one  died 

15  for  all,  then  did  they  all  die,  and  he  died  for  all,  that  the 
living  should  no  longer  live  to  themselves,  but  to  him  who 

16  died  for  them,  and  was  raised  up.  Wherefore  we  from 
henceforth  know  no  one  after  the  flesh  :  though  we  have 
even  known  Christ  after  the  flesh,  but  now  know  we  him 

17  no  longer.  So  that  if  any  one  be  in  Christ,  he  is  a  new 
creature.      The   old    things   have   passed   away :    lo,  all 

18  things  have  become  new.  But  all  things  are  from  God, 
who  hath  reconciled  us  to  himself  through  Jesus  Christ, 

19  and  given  to  us  the  ministry  of  reconciliation.  So  that 
God  was  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world  to  himself,  not 
reckoning  their  trespasses  to  them,  and  having  committed 

20  unto  us  the  doctrine  of  reconciliation.  For  Christ  then 
we  are  ambassadors,  as  though  God  did  beseech  you 
through  us  ;  we  in  Christ's  stead  do  entreat  you,  that  ye 

21  be  reconciled  to  God.  For  he  hath  made  him  who  knew 
no  sin,  to  be  a  sin-oflering  for  us,  that  we  might  become 
the  justified  of  God  in  him. 

VI.  1.     We  then  as  fellow-laborers  also  exhort  you,  that  ye 


II.   COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  309 

2  receive  not  the  grace  of  God  in  vain.  For  he  says,  "  I 
have  heard  thee  in  a  time  accepted,  and  in  the  day  of 
salvation  have  I  succored  thee."     Behold,  now  is  the  ac- 

3  cepted  time,  now  is  the  day  of  salvation  :  Giving  no  of- 
fence in  any  thing  that  our  ministry  may  not  be  blamed  : 

4  but  in  all  things  approving  ourselves  as  ministers  of  God, 
in  much  patience,  in  affliction,  in  necessities,  in  straits, 

5  in   blows,   in   imprisonments,   in   tumults,   in   labors,   in 

6  watchings,  in  fastings  :  in  pureness,  in  knowledge,  in 
long-suffering,  in  kindness,  in  a  holy  spirit,  in  love  un- 

7  feigned,  in  the  word  of  truth,  in  the  power  of  God  ;  by 

8  the  armor  of  righteousness  on  right  hand  and  left,  by 
honor  and  dishonor,  by  good  report  and  evil  report ;  as 

9  deceivers,  and  yet  true  ;  as  unknown,  and  yet  known  ;  as 
dying,  and  lo,  we  are  alive  ;  as  chastened,  yet  not  killed  ; 

10  as  grieved,  yet  always  rejoicing  ;  as  poor,  yet  making 
many  rich ;  as  having  nothing,  yet  possessing  all  things. 

11  O  C^  iinthians,  our  mouth  is  opened  unto  you,  our  heart 

12  has   swelled.     Ye  are  not  straitened  in  us,  but  ye  are 

13  straitened  in  your  own  affections.  Now  as  a  recompense 
for  this,  I  speak  as  to  my  children,  be  ye  also  enlarged. 

14  Become  not  uncongenially  yoked  with  unbelievers  :  for 
what  is  there  common  to  Righteousness  and  Sin  ?  or  what 

15  communion  hath  Light  with  Darkness  ^  and  what  concord 
hath  Christ  with  Belial  ?  or  what  part  hath  a  believer  with 

16  an  infidel  ?  and  what  agreement  hath  the  temple  of  God 
with  idols .?  For  ye  are  the  temple  of  the  living  God,  as 
God  hath  said,  —  "I  will  dwell  in  them,  and  will  walk 
with  them,  and  I  shall  be  their  God,  and  they  shall  be  my 

17  people."  Wherefore,  "  Come  out  from  the  midst  of  them, 
and  be  ye  separated,  saith  the  Lord,  and  touch  not  the 

IS  unclean  thing,  and  I  will  receive  you  ;  and  will  be  a 
Father  unto  you,  and  ye  shall  be  sons  and  daughters  unto 
me,  saith  the  Lord  Almighty." 


310  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

VII.  I.  Having  then  these  promises,  beloved,  let  us  cleanse 
ourselves  from  all  impurity  of  flesh  and  spirit,  perfecting 
holiness  in  the  fear  of  God. 


In  explanation  of  the  peculiar  form  of  St.  Paul's 
language,  in  the  commencement  of  the  fifth  chap- 
ter, we  must  refer  to  those  conceptions  of  the  Sec- 
ond Coming  of  Christ  to  which  it  is  adapted,  —  and 
which,  in  the  fifteenth  chapter  of  the  former  Epistle, 
we  have  already  found  shaping  his  representations 
of  the  immediate  applications  of  the  Doctrine  of  Im- 
mortality. In  that  chapter  are  distinctly  expressed 
the  two  ideas  which  are  prominent  here,  —  that  some 
who  were  then  living  might  be  found  alive  at  the 
coming  of  the  Lord,  and  the  end  of  the  World  ;  and 
the  idea  of  two  bodies,  our  present  one,  adapted  to 
the  conditions  of  our  Earthly  state,  and  another,  to 
be  the  imperishable  organ  of  a  purely  Spiritual  Na- 
ture. The  external  change  which  qualified  for  enter- 
ing into  the  Kingdom  of  God  in  Heaven,  was  wrought 
by  Death,  in  the  laying  aside  the  corruptible,  and 
putting  on  the  incorruptible  body :  "  Flesh  and  blood 
cannot  inherit  the  Kingdom  of  God,  neither  doth 
corruption  inherit  incorruption,"  and  therefore,  says 
the  Apostle,  "  ive  must  all  be  changed^''  —  in  order 
that  what  is  mortal  in  our  constitution  should  be 
adapted  to  the  conditions  of  an  immortal  existence. 
Upon  the  faithful  dead  this  change  would  be  of  the 
nature  of  a  Resurrection,  in  the  form  of  that  celestial 
body  of  which  our  present  terrestrial   body  is  the 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    V. -VII.  311 

seed ;  when  that  which  is  sown  in  weakness  shall  be 
raised  in  Power,  and  that  which  is  sown  in  dishonor 
shall  be  raised  in  Glory.  Upon  those  found  alive  at 
the  Coming  of  the  Lord,  the  change  would  be  of  the 
nature  of  a  transfiguration.  —  the  mortal  garment 
would  be  made  immortal  without  passing  through 
the  transition  state  of  death,  —  or,  as  St.  Paul  ex- 
presses it  in  our  present  context,  "  without  being  un- 
clothed, they  would  be  clothed  upon,  and  mortality 
swallowed  up  of  life."  So  near,  in  the  apprehension 
of  the  times,  was  the  Day  of  the  Lord,  that  "  all  might 
not  die,  nevertheless  all  must  be  changed;  —  in  a  mo- 
ment, in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  at  the  last  trump, 
the  dead  should  be  raised  incorruptible,  and  the  living 
transfigured."*  The  parallel  between  the  two  pas- 
sages holds  in  every  part,  though  the  form  of  expres- 
sion is  varied.  What  in  the  former  is  the  animal 
Body,  is  here  "  the  earthly  tent-house,^''  the  frail  and 
sHght  Tabernacle  that  belongs  to  our  pilgrim  days ; 
—  translated  in  our  version,  without  the  least  regard 
to  English  idiom,  and  almost  unintelligibly,  "  the 
earthly  house  of  this  tabernacle."  What  in  the  for- 
mer is  the  spiritual  Body,  is  here  a  building  of  God, 
a  house  not  made  with  hands,  not  produced  accord- 
ing to  the  earthly  course  of  human  formation,  but 
according  to  laws  of  our  Nature  we  have  not  yet 
ascended  to,  celestial  and  everlasting.  What  in  the 
former  is  represented  by  "  the  mortal  putting  on 
instant  immortality,"  and  by  "  Death  being  swal- 
lowed up  in  Victory,"  is  here  the  investiture  of  the 
incorruptible   garments,   without   experience    of  the 

*  1  Cor.  XV.  51,  52. 


312  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

disembodied  stL.te,  so  "  that  mortality  is  swallowed 
up  by  Life."  The  metaphor  of  "  Death  being  swal- 
lowed up  in  Victory,"  and  of  "  Mortality  swallowed 
up  by  Life,"  is  founded  on  the  conception  that  there 
are  three  states  for  man,  —  Mortal  Life,  Death,  Im- 
mortal Life; — but  that,  in  the  case  of  those  found 
alive  at  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man,  the  change 
would  be  so  immediate  that  Death  in  the  usual  sense 
could  not  be  said  to  exist  at  all,  so  that  nothing 
would  intervene  between  Mortal  Life  and  Immor- 
tality. 

With  this  explanation,  we  will  now  translate  free- 
ly the  first  four  verses  of  the  fifth  chapter,  bearing  in 
mind  the  connection  in  which  St.  Paul  introduces 
them,  namely,  "  that  he  was  devoted  to  the  ministry 
of  spiritual  Christianity,  that  Truth  which  God  had 
caused  to  shine  into  his  heart  by  giving  him  l'"»e  light 
of  the  knowledge  of  His  glory  in  the  face  of  Jesus 
Christ,  —  and  that,  though  as  yet  we  had  this  treas- 
ure in  earthen  vessels,  and  could  realize  it  only  by 
struggling  Faith,  yet,  after  the  example  of  Christ 
himself,  through  all  present  discouragement,  mortal 
weakness,  suffering,  and  death,  the  spirit  of  Life 
might  show  itself  triumphant,  for,  though  the  out- 
ward man  perished,  the  inward  man  might  be  re- 
newed day  by  day,  —  provided  we  look  not  to  the 
things  which  are  seen,  but  to  th&  things  which  are 
unseen ;  for  the  things  which  are  seen  are  but  for  a 
season,  and  the  things  which  are  unseen  are  ever- 
lasting." "  For  w^e  know,"  proceeds  the  Apostle, 
"that  if  our  earthly  /e«Z-house  was  dissolved,  we 
have  a  mansion  built  by  God,  a  house  not  made  with 


II.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII. 


313 


hands,  celestial  and  imperishable.  And  whilst  in 
this  our  earthly  tent,  our  sighings  are  directed  to- 
wards our  imnnortal  Body,  earnestly  desiring  to  put 
on  our  house  which  is  from  Heaven,  yet  upon  this 
condition,  that  we  should  be  clothed  with  our  spirit- 
ual Body,  without  first  meeting  the  nakedness  of 
Death ;  for  we  who  are  in  this  tent  sigh,  being  bur- 
dened, not  that  we  desire  to  be  disembodied  and 
unclothed  by  Death,  but  at  once  to  be  clothed  over 
by  our  great  Change,  that  Mortality  may  be  swal- 
lowed up  by  Life." 

There  are  two  Redemptions  spoken  of  by  St. 
Paul :  first,  a  redemption  on  earth,  the  "  spiritual 
Mind,''^  which  is  life  and  peace,  the  release  from  sin 
and  from  dead  works  of  superstition  to  serve  the 
living  God,  —  the  SouVs  redemption ;  —  and  second- 
ly, the  Body's  redemption,  —  deliverance  from  all 
"the  ills  that  flesh  is  heir  to," — that  manifestation 
of  the  Sons  of  God  for  which  the  persecuted  Church 
waited,  and  sighed,  in  suffering  and  bondage.  In 
the  fifth  verse,  the  first  of  these  Redemptions  is 
called  the  pledge  and  promise  of  the  second.  The 
spiritually  redeemed  should  have  faith  in  God  that 
He  will  complete  what  He  has  commenced  :  and 
the  emancipated  soul  sustain,  in  hope  and  courage, 
the  brief  conditions  of  the  earthly  state :  "  Now  he 
who  must  work  in  us  this  great  external  change  is 
God ;  and  as  an  assurance  of  that  coming  glory  and 
release.  He  has  given  us  the  earnest  of  the  spirit"  : 
that  is,  He  that  hath  taken  the  spirit  into  filial  rela- 
tions with  Himself  will  complete,  in  all  tfiings,  the 
glorious  liberty  of  his  sons,  —  and  the  heart  that  is 
27 


314  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

made  inwardly  free  by  the  Truth  as  it  is  in  Christ, 
must  never  sink,  in  faithlessness  or  fear,  beneath  the 
burdens  of  mortality.  St.  Paul  has  repeated  the 
whole  sentiment  of  this  argument  in  his  Epistle  to 
the  Romans.  I  shall  recite  the  passage  from  the 
eighteenth  verse  of  the  eighth  chapter.  It  speaks  of 
the  two  Redemptions ;  —  of  the  first  being  to  Faith 
the  earnest  of  the  second,  —  and,  to  those  who  faint 
not,  but  are  strengthened  from  the  Life  within,  of  the 
momentary  affliction  working  out  the  everlasting 
glory:  —  "  For  I  account  the  sufferings  of  this  pres- 
ent time  not  worthy  to  be  compared  with  the  glory 
which  shall  hereafter  be  revealed  in  us.  For  the 
earnest  longing  of  the  earthly  creature  waiteth  for 
the  manifestation  of  the  Sons  of  God,  for  we  were 
made  subject  to  frailty,  in  hope  that  we  shall  be  de- 
livered from  the  bondage  of  corruption  into  the  glo- 
rious liberty  of  the  Sons  of  God. '  For  we  know 
that  every  creature  groaneth  and  travaileth  in  pain 
together  until  now,  and  even  we  who  have  the  first 
fruits  of  the  Spirit^  even  we  ourselves  sigh  within 
ourselves,  looking  for  our  adoption,  to  wit,  the  re- 
demption of  our  BodyP 

And  the  spirit  which  Christ  had  made  free,  wait- 
ing for  the  redemption  of  the  Body,  could  no  more 
be  subject  to  the  ordinary  temptations  of  human  good 
or  human  evil.  Neither  fear  nor  flattery,  neither 
Death  nor  Life,  could  now  make  the  influences,  or 
direct  the  path,  of  a  mind  that,  having  buried  its 
earthly  affections,  and  risen  together  with  Christ  to 
a  diviner  hope,  was  hourly  expecting  the  second  com- 
ing of  the  Son  of  Man,  to  judge  the  world  in  Right- 


II.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  315 

eousness.  Might  not  he^  without  suspicion  of  self- 
commendation,  cast  off  the  imputation  of  interest 
or  ambition,  who,  being  new-born  in  Christ,  had 
entombed  his  past  existence,  come  out  from  it  as 
clear  as  though  his  soul  had  never  breathed  but  in 
Christian  air,  knew  no  man  any  longer  after  the 
flesh,  but  only  in  his  spiritual  relations,  and  taking 
the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom  as  his  mission  in  Lif» 
and  his  confidence  in  Death,  had  cast  in  his  lot  with 
that  crucified  and  risen  Master  whose  ambassador 
he  was  ?  If  he  lived,  though  to  meet  toil  and  exile 
and  all  the  forms  of  moral  persecution,  still  it  was 
in  his  Master's  service  and  after  the  similitude  of 
his  Master's  Life  ; — and  if  he  died,  though  it  should 
be  the  martyr's  fate,  it  was  still,  after  the  similitude 
of  his  Master's  death,  to  pass  to  life  eternal,  and  re- 
deemed, both  in  flesh  and  spirit,  to  join  for  ever  the 
emancipated  Sons  of  God.  If  for  such  a  mind  there 
could  be  any  seduction  from  the  pure  service  of  the 
Gospel,  Death  m-ight  offer  it,  but  Life  could  not;  — 
yet,  whatever  the  desire  of  Nature  to  walk  by  sight 
in  glory,  rather  than  by  faith  in  toil,  to  be  absent 
from  the  body  and  present  with  Christ,  —  one  care 
only  could  press  upon  that  heart,  whether  absent  or 
present,  living  or  dying,  to  be  the  Lord's.  "  Where- 
fore," says  St.  Paul,  casting  off,  by  the  force  of  the 
spiritual  argument,  whatever  imputations  his  ene- 
mies might  affix  to  the  motives  of  his  ministry,  — 
"  Wherefore,  we  are  always  of  good  courage,  know- 
ing that  while  we  are  present  in  the  body  we  are 
absent  from  the  Lord ;  for  here  we  are  walking  by 
faith,  not  by  sight,  —  and  only  this  one   thing  we 


316  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

strive  for,  that,  whether  present  or  absent,  we  may 
be  his  accepted,  —  for  we  must  all  appear  before  the 
judgment-seat  of  Christ,  that  every  one  may  receive 
for  the  things  done  in  the  body,  according  to  that  he 
hath  done,  whether  it  be  good  or  bad." 

Such  was  his  defence  against  those  who  attribut- 
ed the  peculiar  character  of  his  Ministry,  especially 
its  spiritual  Liberty,  —  its  abrogation  of  all  religious 
service  but  that  which  flows  from  the  inward  Law 
of  the  <Heart,  —  to  the  common  motives  of  human 
fear  or  favor.  God  had  called  him  to  that  work,  — 
and  woe  unto  him,  if  he  preached  not  the  Gospel ! 
A  necessity  was  laid  upon  him,  —  and  no  fear  could 
contend  with  the  fear  of  quenching  the  Spirit  that 
spoke  to  him  the  divine  command.  The  Truth  that 
makes  free  was  not  of  his  making ;  —  it  had  come 
to  him  direct  from  God,  carried  by  a  divine  force  in- 
to his  alien  heart,  as  the  lightning  opens  the  bosom  of 
the  night,  —  and  his  commission  was,  not  to  tamper 
with  it,  nor  seek  its  present  triumph  by  adapting  it 
to  man's  weakness  or  expectations,  but  to  proclaim 
it,  and  to  trust  it.  What  human  influence  could 
struggle  in  that  heart  which  believed  that  God  had 
so  charged  it,  —  and  that  but  a  day,  or  an  hour,  was 
between  it  and  the  judgment-seat  of  Christ!  "  Know- 
ing, therefore,  the  terror  of  the  Lord,  we  would  per- 
suade men;  to  God  we  are  manifest,  —  and  we 
would  hope  also  that  we  are  manifest  to  your  con- 
sciences." 

It  was  necessary  at  this  point,  considering  the 
style  of  imputation  employed  by  his  opponents,  for 
St.  Paul  to  remind  the  Corinthians,  that  all  this  self- 


II.    COR.   CHAPS.    V.  -  VII.  317 

defence  did  not  proceed  from  any  personal  interest, 
but  was  required  lest  the  representations  of  his  ene- 
mies, who  were  also  the  enemies  of  the  severe  sim- 
plicity of  Gospel  Liberty,  should  have  an  undue  in- 
fluence with  men  weak  in  the  spiritual  faith,  and 
who  in  their  unconfirmed  state  might  be  entangled 
again  in  the  yoke  of  bondage,  and  "  hindered  from 
obeying  the  Truth."  It  was  not  for  his  own  glory, 
but  to  strengthen  them  against  those  who  wished  to 
lead  them  captive  again  in  the  train  of  forsaken  super- 
stitions, that  he  sought  to  establish  their  confidence 
in  his  Ministry,  —  not  that  he  might  be  honored,  but 
that  they  might  stand  free  :  —  "  For  we  are  not  rec- 
ommending ourselves  again  unto  you,  but  we  are 
giving  you  occasion  to  glory  on  our  account,  —  that 
ye  may  have  wherewith  to  answer  those  who  would 
glory  for  appearances,  and  not  for  realities  of  the 
soul." 

The  passage  from  the  thirteenth  verse  to  the  close 
of  the  fifth  chapter  is  intended  to  show,  that  what- 
ever might  be  any  man's  desire  for  personal  distinc- 
tion, whatever  interested  motives  might  have  sway 
with  him,  yet  that  all  self-glory  in  relation  to  Chris- 
tianity was  an  impossibility,  and  a  self-contradiction. 
No  man  could  appropriate  to  himself  that  gift  of 
God,  or  could  arrogate  any  share  in  that  glory  which 
had  flowed  from  the  divine  Mercy  and  Truth  alone. 
No  man,  without  violating  its  spirit,  and  showing 
that  he  had  no  part  in  it,  could  make  the  Gospel  of 
grace  and  forgiveness  minister  to  the  pride  of  self. 
If  St.  Paul  could  thus  show  that  the  very  essence  of 
Christianity  extinguished  those  selfish  aims,  the  im- 

27* 


318  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

putation  of  which  was  weakening  his  influence  at 
Corinth,  he  might  afterwards  speak  freely  of  those 
circumstances  in  his  Apostolic  relations  towards 
them  which,  by  giving  him  a  claim  upon  their  con- 
fidence, and  confirming  his  authority,  should  enable 
him  to  frustrate  the  attempts  of  those  who  would 
mislead  them  from  the  Truth.  Accordingly,  he  here 
speaks  of  the  impossibility  of  personal  glory  being 
grafted  on  the  divine  beneficence  of  Christianity,  — 
and,  that  suspicion  being  removed,  in  the  next  chap- 
ter he  proceeds  to  state  those  circumstances  which, 
by  accrediting  both  his  Apostleship  and  his  disinter- 
estedness, ought  so  to  establish  his  influence  as  to 
enable  him  to  preserve  his  own  converts  in  the  un- 
corrupted  simplicity  of  the  spiritual  Gospel.  The 
passage  (ver.  13-21),  to  which  we  now  proceed,  is 
one  of  the  battle-grounds  of  doctrinal  controversy ;  — 
but  it  must  receive  its  explanation  from  the  connec- 
tion in  which  it  occurs.  We  shall  regard  it  solely 
in  that  relation. 

St.  Paul  averts  from  himself  the  charge  of  ambi- 
tion in  connection  with  his  ministry  of  the  Gospel, 
on  two  grounds  :  —  first,  that  no  man  could  make  it 
a  ground  of  personal  glory,  for  it  was  no  man's  boon, 
but  the  gift  of  God  to  all,  —  all  alike  require  it,  —  it 
found  all  needy  and  made  them  whole ;  and  second- 
ly, that  it  was  the  very  essence  of  Christianity,  that 
no  man  should  live  to  himself,  or  seek  his  own.  If 
its  Apostle  was  ever  transported  beyond  himself,  it 
was  not  for  his  own  glory, — but  for  the  glory  of 
God :  or,  if  he  became  all  things  to  all  men,  that  by 
wisdom  and  prudence  he  might  win  them  to  Christ, 


II.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  319 

it  was  not  for  his  own  sake,  but  for  the  sake  of  the 
weak  brother  for  whom  Christ  died.  For  the  love 
of  Christ  held  back  his  Apostle  from  any  course  not 
dictated  by  that  divine  Love  ; — for  he  thus  judged, 
that  if  one  died  for  all,  — then  all  had  died,  —  died, 
as  he  had  died,  to  a  selfish  life,  else  they  were  none 
of  his; — because  he  died  for  all,  that  all  should  be 
dead  to  their  past  existence,  and  live  no  longer  unto 
themselves,  but  unto  him  who  died  and  rose  for 
them.  So  that  the  Christian  must  no  longer  con- 
sider any  man  in  his  worldly  aspects,  or  with  a  re- 
gard to  persons ;  —  he  must  know  him  no  more  after 
the  flesh,  but  in  his  spiritual  relations,  in  which  all 
men  are  alike,  and  vainglory  is  excluded.  Nay, 
though  he  had  once  viewed  Christ  after  the  flesh,  in 
his  Earthly  and  Jewish  relations,  and  connected  car- 
nal, and  national,  hopes  with  the  Hebrew  Messiah, 
now  must  he  know  him  so  no  more ;  —  for  these  old, 
exclusive  views  have  passed  away,  —  the  Christ  had 
died  to  abolish  all  spiritual  distinctions  among  man- 
kind, national  and  individual,  —  by  Death  he  had 
disrobed  himself  of  all  partial  affinities,  and  all  things 
were  become  new;  —  the  Jewish  Messiah  had  ful- 
filled the  Law,  and  passing  into  the  Heavens  out  of 
the  sphere  of  Jewish  peculiarities  had  become  the 
Saviour  of  the  World;  —  and  now  no  man  could 
graft  self-glory  on  Christianity,  either  on  personal  or 
on  national  grounds,  for  all  were  alike  related  to  the 
spiritual  Christ,  and  all  were  of  God,  who  was  rec- 
onciling the  world  unto  Himself  through  his  one 
Mediator,  not  imputing  their  past  trespasses  to  those 
who,  through  spiritual  faith,  had  become  new  crea- 


320  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

tures  in  him.  In  this  universal  kingdom  and  glory, 
St.  Paul  claimed  but  an  elder  brother's  place  in  rela- 
tion to  those  who  had  not  yet  received  it;  and  be- 
sought them,  as  in  Christ's  stead,  the  elder  Brother 
of  Mankind,  to  be  reconciled  to  God;  for  He  had 
broken  down  the  partition -wall  between  Jew  and 
Gentile;  —  there  was  no  more  of  legal  disqualifica- 
tion, or  ceremonial  fitness.  As  the  sin-offering  under 
the  Law  cleansed  away  the  ritual  impurity  which 
Priest  or  People  had  unknowingly  contracted,  and 
restored  their  lost  consecration,  —  so,  in  this  sense, 
was  Christ  a  lamb  without  spot  or  blemish,  as  the 
sin-offering  of  the  World,  for  with  him  was  abol- 
ished for  ever  the  Righteousness  of  ordinances,  and  all 
men  were  placed  in  purely  spiritual  relations  to  their 
God,  — their  true  and  inward  bond  with  the  Father 
of  their  souls  being  now  the  Righteousness  of  God 
that  flows  from  Faith,  —  out  of  a  filial  and  a  trust- 
ing Heart. 

You  will  recollect  that  the  sin-offerings  of  the 
Law  never  removed  moral  guilt,  but  only  some  rit- 
ual offence,  which,  under  a  ceremonial  Religion, 
disqualified  for  worship.  You  will  remember  also 
that  it  was  from  such  ritual  disqualifications,  and 
such  alone,  that  the  death  of  Jesus,  with  whom  the 
Law  of  ordinances  was  abolished,  redeemed  for, ever 
the  whole  world,  who  were  no  longer  under  the  Law 
but  under  the  Spirit.  That  this  is  the  whole  extent 
of  the  sacrificial  eflicacy  figuratively  applied  to  the 
death  of  Christ,  is  distinctly  stated  In  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews,  at  the  fifteenth  verse  of  the  ninth 
chapter :  "  He  is  the  Mediator  of  the  new  Covenant, 


II.    COR.    CHAPS,    v.- VII.  321 

that  by  means  of  death,  for  the  redemption  of  the 
transgressions  that  ivere  under  the  first  Covenant^ 
they  who  are  called  might  receive  the  promise  of 
the  everlasting  inheritance." 

And  when  we  bear  in  mind  the  connection  in 
which  the  death  of  Christ  is  here  introduced,  it  will 
be  evident  that  the  only  idea  in  the  mind  of  the 
Apostle  was  the  abolition  of  religious  distinctions, 
and  the  union  of  all  men  in  spiritual  Liberty ;  so 
that  none  could  find  the  sources  of  personal  impor- 
tance in  that  Gospel  whose  first  principle  it  was, 
that,  dying  to  the  Law  of  self  and  sin,  they  should 
live  no  more  unto  themselves,  but  the  Life  of  him 
who  died  in  Love,  and  now  liveth  unto  God. 

(Ch.  VI.)  But  though  that  Gospel  extinguished 
the  selfish  and  ambitious  sentiment,  still  its  Apostle, 
as  an  ambassador  for  Christ,  had  a  commission  from 
God  to  urge  it  home  upon  the  hearts  of  all  people, 
—  and  a  claim  to  be  esteemed  very  highly,  in  love, 
for  his  work's  sake.  That  he  sought  no  glory  for 
himself,  was  no  reason  why  his  just  influence  and 
authority  should  be  weakened  amongst  those  who 
evidently  had  not  strength  to  stand  alone  in  the 
liberty  wherewith  Christ  had  made  them  free,  —  and 
who,  not  grown  up  in  spiritual  things  to  the  stature 
of  the  Apostle,  were  open  to  the  seductions  of  the 
false  teachers  who  dispensed  some  Jewish  or  Hea- 
then notions,  accommodated  to  the  frailty  of  these 
babes  in  Christ.  To  such  he  did  not  hesitate  "to 
magnify  his  office,"  if,  by  impressing  them  with  his 
just  claims  on  their  gratitude  and  confidence,  he 
could  persuade  them  to  receive  the  Truth  of  Christ 


322  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

in  the  spiritual  form  he  had  administered  it  to  thecn, 
and  so  preserve  them  from  the  moral  dangers  inci- 
dent to  men  who,  not  having  their  stability  within 
themselves,  depended  for  their  safe  guidance  upon 
the  soundness  of  those  to  whom  their  trust  was 
given.  It  was  right,  therefore,  that,  as  one  "  put  in 
trust  with  the  Gospel,"  he  should  exhort  them  not 
to  receive  the  grace  of  God  in  vain ;  —  that,  for  those 
who  would  become  new  creatures,  casting  behind 
them  their  former  feebleness  of  outward  depend- 
ence, "  now  was  the  accepted  time,  now  was  the  day 
of  Salvation  "  ;  —  and  that,  against  the  influence  of 
unspiritual  advisers  tampering  with  their  new-born 
and  feeble  faith,  he  should  confirm  his  own  authority 
by  setting  forth  every  plea  that  justly  entitled  him  to 
a  power  over  their  hearts.  It  was  with  this  view 
that  he  drew  up  that  noble  statement  of  his  labors 
in  the  Gospel,  as  one  who  used  no  undue  means 
with  those  whom  he  regarded  as  his  children  in  the 
Faith,  —  "seeking  to  give  no  offence  in  anything, 
that  the  ministry  might  not  be  blamed,  but  approv- 
ing himself  to  God,  in  patience,  in  affliction,  in  im- 
prisonments, in  watchings,  —  by  pureness,  by  long- 
suffering,  by  love  unfeigned,  by  the  word  of  Truth, 
by  the  power  of  God  upon  the  convinced  heart,  — 
by  the  armor  of  righteousness  on  the  right  hand  and 
on  the  left,  offensive  and  defensive ;  through  honor 
and  dishonor,  —  through  evil  report  and  good  report, 

—  treated  as  a  deceiver,  and  yet  true,  —  as  obscure, 
and  yet  having  a  name  that  would  never  perish,  — 
grieved,  yet  rejoicing,  —  poor,  yet  making  many  rich, 

—  having  nothing,  yet  possessing  all  things." 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    V.-VII.  323 

When  the  fountains  of  the  heart  are  once  broken 
up,  thoughts  pour  forth  which  at  all  other  moments 
would  be  restrained:  whatever  is  in  the  soul  is  then 
borne  out  on  the  torrent  of  the  affections.  St.  Paul 
had  not  intended  to  make  this  personal  appeal, — 
but  it  came:  —  "Our  tongue  is  loosed,  O  Corinthi- 
ans, for  our  heart  is  burst.  Be  not  straitened  to- 
wards us,  as  our  heart  is  not  straitened  towards 
you :  we  speak  to  you,  as  our  spiritual  children,  and 
as  our  recompense  we  ask  only  that  you  would  open 
to  us  your  bosoms,  —  turn  away  from  seducers, — 
hold  no  more  communion  with  unrighteousness,  — 
and,  as  temples  of  the  living  God,  cleanse  the  soul 
from  idols,  —  accepting  the  overture  of  God,  '  I  will 
be  their  God,  and  they  shall  be  my  people.'  Come 
out  from  among  them,  —  touch  not  the  unclean 
thing,  and  '  I  will  receive  you,  and  will  be  a  Father 
unto  you,  and  ye  shall  be  unto  me  as  sons  and 
daughters,  saith  the  Lord  Almighty.' " 

Throughout  this  Section,  I  have  sought  no  pres- 
ent applications,  nor  transferred  a  word  or  a  thought 
from  the  relations  between  St.  Paul  and  the  Corin- 
thians to  our  own  business  and  bosoms.  But  as 
the  Gospel  never  dies,  its  warnings  and  its  promises 
are  never  out  of  season.  Notwithstanding  Paul's 
expectation,  the  End  is  not  yet :  but  to  those  whose 
hearts  Death  hath  rent,  and  whom  Mortality  makes 
to  feel  that,  as  they  walk  this  Earth  they  are  tread- 
ing on  their  graves,  never  can  come  amiss  the  warn- 
ing voice,  — "  Now  is  the  accepted  time,  now  is  the 
day  of  Salvation  "  ;  —  and  to  the  feeble  and  lapsing 


324  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Faith  of  a  nature  tempted  and  frail  as  ours,  never 
can  be  unneeded  the  word  of  exhortation,  to  "receive 
not  the  grace  of  God  in  vain,^^  and  if  we  have  a 
heavenly  Hope,  "  to  cleanse  ourselves  from  all  dis- 
qualifying sins  of  flesh  and  spirit,  perfecting  holiness 
in  the  fear  of  God."     (Ch.  VII.  1.) 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  325 


SECTION  V. 

THE    LAW    OF  MORAL    INFLUENCE. PAUL's  INTENSE  THANK- 
FULNESS   THAT     HIS     REMONSTRANCE     WITH     THEIR      SINS 

HAD      NOT    SPIRITUALLY      INJURED     THE      CORINTHIANS. 

THE    DOCTRINE    OF    CONTRITION. THE    SORROW    THAT    IS 

ROOTED  IN  THE    WORLD  ;    AND  THE   SORROW  THAT  IS  ROOT- 
ED  IN  GOD. 


CHAP.  VII.   2-16. 


2  Receive  us  ;  we  have  wronged  no  one,  we  have  cor 
rupted   no   one,  we    have   taken  advantage    of  no  one 

3  I  speak  not  to  condemn  you,  for  I  have  already  said 
that  ye  are  in  our  hearts,  to  die  together  and  to  live  to 

4  gether.  Great  is  my  freedom  of  speech  towards  you 
great  is  my  glorying  for  you  :  I  am  filled  with  consola 
tion  ;  I  exceedingly  abound  in  joy  under  all  our  affliction 

5  For  when  we  came  into  Macedonia  our  flesh  had  no  rest 
but  on  all  sides  we  were  troubled  :  without  were  fightings 

6  within  were  fears.  But  God,  who  comforteth  those  who 
are   cast  down,    comforted  us  by  the  coming  of  Titus 

7  and  not  by  his  coming  only,  but  also  by  the  comfort 
wherewith  he  was  comforted  by  you,  when  he  told  us  of 
your  desire,  your  mourning,  your  zealous  affection    for 

8  me,  —  so  that  I  rejoiced  the  more.  Because  if  I  pained 
you  by  the  Epistle,  I  do  not  repent,  even  if  I  did  repent, 
for  I  see  that  same  Letter,  though  but  for  a  season,  has 

28 


326  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

9  pained  you.  Now  I  rejoice,  not  that  ye  were  pained,  but 
that  ye  were  pained  unto  repentance,  for  ye  were  pained 
after  a  godly  manner,  so  that  in  nothing  have  ye  received 

10  injury  from  us.  For  godly  sorrow  worketh  a  renewal  of 
the  soul  unto  Salvation,  that  has  not  to  be  repented  of; 

11  but  the  sorrow  of  the  world  worketh  death.  For,  behold, 
this  selfsame  thing,  that  ye  were  pained  after  a  godly 
manner,  what  carefulness  it  wrought  in  you,  yea  what  de- 
fending, yea  what  discontent,  yea  what  fear,  yea  what  de- 
sire, yea  what  zeal,  yea  what  vindication  !     Altogether  ye 

12  have  proved  yourselves  clear  in  this  matter.  If  then  I 
so  wrote  to  you,  I  did  it  not  on  account  of  him  that  did 
the  wrong,  nor  on  account  of  him  who  was  wronged,  but 
that  the  care  which  we  have  towards  you,  for  your  own 
sakes,    might  be    made    manifest   in   the  sight   of  God. 

13  Wherefore  we  were  comforted  in  your  comfort,  and  rath- 
er we  more  abundantly  rejoiced  in  the  joy  of  Titus,  be- 

14  cause  his  spirit  was  refreshed  by  you  all.  So  that  if  I 
have  boasted  to  him  any  thing  on  your  behalf,  I  am  not 
ashamed,  but  as  I  have  said  all  things  to  you  in  Truth,  so 
also   my   boasting  of  you  to  Titus  has  become   Truth. 

15  And  his  tenderness  is  more  abundant  towards  you,  whilst 
he  remembereth  the  obedience  of  you  all,  how  ye  re- 

16  ceived  him  with  fear  and  trembling.  I  rejoice  that  alto- 
gether I  have  confidence  in  you. 


There  are  in  this  Chapter  some  of  the  inconsis- 
tencies of  feeling  that  belong  to  a  generous  nature, 
when  its  affections  are  brought  into  intimate  rela- 
tions with  those  who  are  not  altogether  worthy  of 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  327 

its  love.  It  speaks  out  of  the  fulness  and  richness 
of  its  own  heart ;  it  takes  no  grudging  measure  of 
what  they  may  be  worthy  to  inspire,  but  pours  out 
upon  them  a  love  and  confidence  that  come  from  in- 
ward springs.  Yet  as  such  natures  are  genuine,  as 
well  as  generous,  the  bare  and  unadorned  truth  will 
at  times  be  forced  upon  them,  the  barrenness  of 
the  hearts  on  which  they  have  shed  their  light  and 
warmth  will  lie  exposed  in  all  their  bleakness  and 
poverty,  —  and  there  will  be  alternations  in  the  bosom, 
of  gushing  affections,  and  chilling  experiences  of  the 
unworthiness  of  their  objects.  In  a  strong  and  no- 
ble heart  the  generous  affections,  whether  deserved 
or  undeserved,  will  always  regain  their  sway,  and 
must  at  last  create  in  others  the  characters  they  have 
presupposed. 

Such  changes  are  not  properly  inconsistencies ; 
they  are  not  shifting  and  capricious  feelings  in  rela- 
tion to  the  same  objects,  but  the  just  and  natural 
emotions  of  the  same  heart,  according  as  its  own 
strong  trusts,  and  tender  longings,  and  ardent  sym- 
pathies, are  in  sole  possession  of  its  thoughts,  —  or 
the  painful  images  of  barren  and  unanswering  na- 
tures are  filling  the  mind,  and  pressing  too  distinctly 
upon  fainting  hopes.  We  have  here  St.  Paul,  at  one 
moment  pleading  with  the  Corinthians  for  their  con- 
fidence and  love,  —  and  in  the  next,  rejoicing  in  his 
possession  of  them  ;  —  at  one  moment  asking  for 
his  place  in  their  affections,  stating  his  claims  in  the 
spirit  of  one  who  was  doubtful  of  his  position,  —  and 
in  the  next,  glorying  in  their  obedience,  and  express- 
ing an  assurance  that  they  would  justify  his  most  con- 


328  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

fiding  hopes.  His  claim  indeed  upon  their  moral  love 
was  one  which  the  infirm  side  of  human  nature  is  slow 
to  acknowledge,  even  where  it  is  maintained  with 
the  wisdom  of  the  serpent,  and  the  harmlessness  of 
the  dove.  He  had  been  simply  true  in  his  spiritual 
treatment  of  their  case ;  —  he  had  not  helped  them 
to  disguise  or  cover  their  sins  ;  he  had  made  no  com- 
promise with  their  pernicious  doctrines ;  nor  hesitat- 
ed to  disturb  their  habits,  and  their  ease,  by  clear 
exposure  of  the  dangerous  laxity  of  their  associations 
and  their  frimidships.  He  had  even  touched  the  un- 
sound spot,  placed  his  hand  upon  the  sinner  among 
them,  and  demanded  the  separation  of  the  diseased 
member;  —  he  had  singled  out  the  superstitions,  and 
speculations,  that  were  disturbing  the  moral  power 
of  the  Law  of  Liberty,  and  he  had  required  their 
renunciation  of  the  very  world  in  which  they  lived, 
since  they  could  not  breathe  in  it  safely,  —  "  Come 
out  from  among  them,  and  be  ye  separate,  and  touch 
not  the  unclean  thing,"  — rather  than  that  evil  com- 
munications should  corrupt  good  principles,  and  their 
yet  feeble  Faith  inhale  some  polluting  influences 
from  the  surrounding  habits  of  an  idolatrous  life. 
H^  had  suffered  no  evil  thing  to  cleave  to  them  with- 
out laying  his  hand  upon  it,  and  now  with  a  clear 
conscience,  as  one  who  had  dealt  honestly  with  their 
souls,  he  could  stand  before  God,  and  advance  the 
highest  claims  which  one  human  being  can  have  upon 
another,  —  spiritual  faithfulness,  —  sacredness  pre- 
served, and  sympathy  not  violated,  —  fidelity  to  all 
moral  interests,  as  the  first  Duty  and  the  only  Love : 
—  "  Receive  us  :  we  have  wronged  no  man,  we  have 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  329 

corrupted  no  man,  —  we  have  taken  advantage  of 
no  man." 

What  other  benefits,  kindnesses,  compliances,  or 
unmoral  self-sacrifices  and  reluctant  yieldings  of  a 
gentle  nature,  unwilling  to  give  pain  and  unaccus- 
tomed to  oppose,  —  will  compare  their  weight  of 
Love  with  a  service  of  this  kind,  with  that  noble 
Truth  which  breathes  a  higher  sentiment  through 
the  weakness  of  the  affections,  —  which  has  the 
strength  to  resist  evil,  —  which  holds  that  it  has  no 
life  when  it  ceases  to  be  sacred,  and  that  its  highest 
function  towards  any  other  heart  is  to  be  a  pure,  full, 
and  unsuspected  witness  in  whatever  relates  to  the 
interests  or  the  perils  of  the  moral  principle.  For  no 
support,  when  we  are  right,  can  be  derived  from  those 
who  are  ready  to  yield  to  us  even  when  we  are 
wrong.  Those  who  cover  our  sins  cannot  sustain 
our  virtues.  Those  who  are  ready  to  soothe  us  with 
their  indulgence  and  soft  flatteries,  when  we  are  weak 
and  erring,  have  lost  the  privilege  to  hold  us  up,  when 
we  must  stand  alone  against  unmerited  reproach, 
and  follow  our  own  conscience  against  the  world. 
Those  who  nurse  our  weakness  abdicate  the  power 
of  ministering  to  our  strength.  And  so,  simple  com- 
pliance yields  every  thing  that  is  worth  keeping  or 
living  for ;  for  to  have  the  opinions  and  the  sympa- 
thies of  another  entirely  at  your  command,  unable 
to  resist  the  spell  of  your  influence,  is  just  to  lose 
all  the  moral  uses  of  that  mind,  inasmuch  as  it  is 
impossible  to  draw  from  it  any  independent  support. 
And  hence  the  holy  necessity  of  Sympathy  being 
kept    in    strict   subordination    to   inviolable    Truth. 

28* 


330  SECOND    EPISTL,E    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

There  is  no  lack  of  Kindness  in  the  world ;  the  in- 
stincts of  Humanity  are  gentle  and  tender;  what  is 
wanted  is  that  these  instincts  should  become  honored 
and  sacred,  —  that  the  Heart  in  its  nearest  relations 
should  ally  itself  with  the  calmest  fidelity  to  convic- 
tions of  Duty,  —  that  no  other  part  of  our  Nature 
should  have  the  power  of  compromising  our  holiness, 
our  individual  sense  of  Right.  It  is  in  the  closest 
intercourses  of  life  that  temptation  to  this  unfaithful- 
ness abounds, —  sometimes  from  natural  partiality? 
leading  to  weakness  and  blindness ;  sometimes  for 
the  sake  of  peace;  sometimes  through  the  fear  of 
giving  pain;  and  sometimes  from  the  prevailing  in- 
fluence of  a  stronger  mind,  ungenerously  used ;  and 
then  there  are  two  seducers,  the  tempter  and  the 
yielder.  For  it  is  treasonable  to  Love,  as  to  Duty, 
when  our  communion  with  others  is  suffered  to  break 
our  fellowship  with  God,  —  when  that  which  the 
Heart  permits  condemns  the  Conscience,  —  when 
the  interest  that  another  has  with  us,  or  the  power 
of  persuasion  that  another  has  over  us,  leads  us  away 
from  strict  union  with  ourselves,  and  so  dethrones 
the  moral  Principle  which  is  the  light  and  guide  of 
the  Affections.  These  are  the  unconscientious  con- 
nections and  intercourses  that  '•^  corrupt ''^  the  heart 
of  Life.  When  the  mere  tendency  to  assimilation, 
the  immediate  sympathies,  are  stronger  than  the 
moral  Principle,  the  elements  of  highest  influence  are 
all  cast  away,  and  the  most  intimate  connections  are 
the  most  actively  engaged  in  weakening  the  charac- 
ter. As  parental  Love  degrades  itself  to  a  mere 
instinct,    except    when    it   manifests   its   tenderness 


[I.    COR.    CHAP.    VII. 


331 


through  the  guidance  of  sentiments  of  the  most  un- 
yielding sacredness,  —  so  our  moral  connection  with 
others  becomes  low  and  selfish  whenever,  either  in 
our  inward  or  our  outward  Life,  it  interferes  with 
the  simplicity  and  truth  of  the  individual  mind.  In- 
deed, only  weak  or  selfish  affections  could  thus  con- 
sent to  live ;  the  generous  and  self-devoting  ones 
would  never  expect  either  to  receive  or  to  confer 
good,  if  by  any  compromise  they  quenched  or  dis- 
honored the  light  of  God  and  Truth  within  them- 
selves. 

Not  that  it  is  necessary  that  we  should  become 
Censors  of  one  another, —  or  that  there  should  be 
even  a  show  of  interference  with  our  moral  Liberty. 
To  deem  it  a  Duty  to  press  our  notions  of  Right 
upon  all  around  us  is  often,  even  where  we  are  most 
right,  only  a  mischievous  activity  that  betrays  a  very 
superficial  sense  of  the  deep  and  individual  sources 
from  which  moral  acts  must  spring,  if  they  are  to 
have  the  least  value  in  themselves,  —  or  to  be  of  any 
genuine  efficacy  in  elevating  the  character.  In  the 
equal  intercourses  of  life,  it  is  no  part  of  our  social 
responsibility  that  the  more  enlightened  Conscience 
should  insist  upon  making  a  direct  conveyance  of  its 
superior  knowledge  to  the  less  instructed,  or  that  the 
honest  and  faithful  Conscience  should  demand  an 
account  from  every  lapsed  and  faithless  one.  It  is 
enough  that  we  are  clear,  unambiguous,  uncompro- 
mising, in  our  own  words  and  lives,  —  that  by  mani- 
festation of  the  Truth  we  commend  ourselves  to 
every  man's  Conscience  in  the  sight  of  God,  —  and 
that,  if  any  man  sins  or  tampers  with  conviction,  we 


332  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

have  not  made  his  fall  easy  to  him,  or  helped  to  con- 
ceal the  Light  that  condemns  him.  Of  course  there 
are  cases  when  our  Duty  goes  far  beyond  this,  — 
when  more  is  demanded  of  us  than  open  and  con- 
sistent Example,  —  when  every  bond  of  sacredness 
requires  that  we  should  come  into  direct  collision 
with  the  evil  thing,  lay  our  hand  on  our  brother's 
shoulder  and  search  his  very  heart,  —  remonstrate, 
entreat,  persuade,  warn,  and  rebuke,  with  a  manly 
and  a  holy  freedom  :  but  the  general  moral  action 
of  Society  is  not  of  this  nature,  and  is  mainly  carried 
on  by  each  man  being  simply  true  to  himself,  with- 
out any  thought  of  exerting  an  influence  on  the  sen- 
timents of  other  men's  hearts,  or  the  directions  of 
other  men's  lives.  And  this  is  the  purest  and  the 
most  effectual  exertion  of  moral  Power,  because  it 
acts  simply  through  the  maintenance  of  its  own  sin- 
cerity, and  without  offence  to  those  personal  jeal- 
ousies which  resent  direct  appeals.  Rarely  indeed 
would  the  necessity  for  direct  interference  be  found 
to  arise,  if  Society  and  Individuals  made  their  con- 
victions respected  by  never  participating  in  their  vio- 
lation. Without  any  public  man  assuming  the  po- 
sition of  a  Censor,  or  contracting  the  reputation  of  a 
Purist,  public  Honor  might  be  maintained  inviolate, 
if  Public  Assemblies  encountered  every  exhibition 
of  the  Corruption  of  the  times  with  a  cold  and  for-  ^ 
bidding  sternness,  whose  severe,  though  unuttered) 
repulse  Dishonor  would  be  forced  to  understand.  If 
the  principled,  without  any  assumption,  were  simply^ 
true  to  themselves,  the  unprincipled  would  quickly/ 
lind  their  standing.     The  mere  negative  action  of 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  333 

every  man  of  Honor,  in  his  cold  withdrawal  from 
Dishonor,  simply  refusing  every  species  of  associa- 
tion with  it,  would  preserve  at  a  high  standard  the 
purity  of  Public  Opinion,  by  far  the  most  important 
of  our  earthly  Tribunals.  And  it  is  not  the  corrupt 
alone  who  are  the  corrupters,  but  even  the  personally 
pure,  so  long  as  they  withhold  at  least  this  negative 
counteraction,  a  decided  manifestation  of  the  absence 
of  all  sympathy  or  cooperation  with  any  public  man 
stained  with  corruption.  Again,  in  private  or  do- 
mestic life,  or  in  the  common  intercourses  of  Society, 
without  any  one  being  required  to  take  upon  himself 
the  invidious  office  of  direct  reproof,  how  effectually 
might  social  offences  be  subdued,  and  graver  corrup- 
tion made  to  know  itself  and  its  place,  if  the  Truth 
and  Sincerity  of  every  individual  heart  deliberately 
refused  to  lend  the  slightest  cover  to  the  wrong,  —  if 
the  inward  sympathies  of  the  Conscience  were  re- 
garded as  better  guides  than  the  false  courtesies  of 
usage,  —  if  no  man's  levity  or  folly  received  the 
patronage  of  insincere  smiles,  and  no  man's  coarse- 
ness or  profligacy  could  show  themselves  in  intimate 
communication  and  friendship  with  gentle  and  hon- 
orable minds.  The  law  of  Christian  Purity  requires 
no  man  to  be  a  Reprover  of  his  Brethren,  but  it  does 
require  every  man  to  make  manifest  his  own  Con- 
science, to  hold  himself  apart  from  every  association 
with  evil ;  and  if  this  is  not  done,  —  not  offensively, 
but  unequivocally^  —  the  sounder  part  of  Society  can- 
not say  that  it  "  has  corrupted  no  man,"  —  for  it  has 
borne  with  corruption,  and  smiled  upon  it,  and  taken 
it  by  the  hand,  and  kept  its  company,  and  God  may 


334  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

charge  the  guilt  upon  those  who  have  done  nothing 
to  abate  the  evil,  even  as  he  declared  that  he  would 
require  the  souls  of  those  who  died  in  their  sins  at 
the  hands  of  the  Prophets  who  raised  no  warn- 
ing voice ;  for  now  all  are  commissioned  Prophets, 
charged  to  reveal  the  holiest  Light  that  is  in  them, 
that  God  may  be  glorified. 

It  is  evident,  indeed,  that  when  St.  Paul  says  of 
himself,  that  "  he  corrupted  no  man,"  he  was  not 
supposing  that  any  one  had  charged  him  with  the 
direct  introduction  of  vicious  influences:  —  he  was 
contemplating  that  Corruption  which  he  might  have 
promoted,  by  withholding  the  Light,  which  he  had 
the  power  of  directing  against  it.  And  in  this  sense, 
the  real  corrupters  of  Society  may  be,  not  the  cor- 
rupt, but  those  who  have  held  back  the  righteous 
leaven,  the  salt  that  has  lost  its  savor,  the  innocent 
who  have  not  even  the  moral  courage  to  show  what 
they  think  of  the  effrontery  of  Impurity,  —  the  se- 
rious, who  yet  timidly  succumb  before  some  loud- 
voiced  scoffer,  —  the  heart  trembling  all  over  with 
religious  sensibilities,  that  yet  suffers  itself  through 
false  shame  to  be  beaten  down  into  outward  and 
practical  acquiescence  by  some  rude  and  world- 
ly nature.  Such  un manifested,  and  acquiescent, 
Consciences  must  not  plead,  that  they  have  been 
"  wronged,"  and  "  corrupted,"  and  "  taken  advan- 
tage of,"  by  the  stronger  and  coarser  natures  :  they 
are  the  wrongdoers  and  corrupters,  for  they  have 
sinned  against  Light,  and  refused  their  Mission. 

And  the  mind  that  administers  a  moral  influence, 
simply  because  it  must  be  true  to  itself  and  show  its 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  335 

Love  in  -anion  with  its  Holiness,  whilst  it  sustains 
the  sacred  character  that  belongs  to  all  pure  affec- 
tions, clothes  thatsacredness  with  the  mightiest  pow- 
ers of  persuasion.  For  moral  influence  breathes  a 
different  spirit,  and  works  totally  different  effects, 
when  it  is  felt  that  it  comes  necessarily  from  the 
Truth  and  Consistency  of  the  mind  that  imparts  it, 
—  and  when  it  is  suspected  that  it  is  an  intended 
lesson,  purposely  designed  to  awaken  or  instruct  a 
defective  Conscience.  These  arrows  of  influence 
should  be  stripped  of  their  barbs,  and  strike  without 
being  aimed.  They  should  be  seen  to  come  down 
upon  us  from  calm  heights,  from  a  fixed  sacredness 
that  cannot  alter,' — and  without  disturbance  of  the 
passions.  When  the  Heart  preserves  all  its  tender- 
ness, and  the  Conscience  all  its  sacredness,  and  the 
moral  act  is  one  of  simple  Truth  and  Love,  there  is 
hope  that  the  personal  influence,  because  perfectly 
pure,  will  be  perfectly  effective.  No  sooner  does  St. 
Paul  find  himself  placing  his  claims  upon  the  Co- 
rinthians on  grounds  that  might  imply  something  of 
a  moral  separation  between  them,  than  he  adds  the 
assurance  that  the  Affections  were  not  disturbed,  and 
that  the  very  freedom  with  which  he  had  spoken 
manifested  a  love  towards  them  that,  by  betraying 
no  higher  interest,  might  be  able  to  justify  itself  in 
the  sight  of  God :  "  I  speak  not  this  to  condemn 
you,  —  for  I  have  said  before,  that  ye  are  in  our 
hearts,  to  die  together  and  to  live  together."  And, 
like  every  noble  nature,  he  dealt  even  with  their 
wrong  in  that  spirit  of  confidence  which  exalts  rather 
than  depresses,  and  lifts  above  the  evil  in  the  same 


336  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

moment  that  it  is  exposing  its  existence :  "  Great  is 
my  freedom  of  speech  towards  you,  —  great  is  my 
confidence  in  you :  I  am  filled  with  comfort,  I  ex- 
ceedingly abound  in  joy  under  all  our  tribulation." 
Again,  at  the  twelfth  verse,  he  affirms  with  some- 
thing even  of  the  exaggeration  of  a  right  Principle, 
that  it  was  not  their  wrong-doing,  nor  any  sentiment 
of  his  mind  in  relation  to  the  evil  merely,  but  his  love 
for  them,  and  his  desire  for  such  a  union  of  the  affec- 
tions with  them  as  God  could  approve,  that  had  led 
to  his  freedom  of  remonstrance :  —  "  If,  therefore,  I  so 
wrote  unto  you,  I  did  it  not  for  his  cause  that  had 
done  the  wrong,  nor  on  account  of  him  that  had  suf- 
fered the  wrong,  —  but  rather  that  our  earnest  affec- 
tion might  be  manifested  for  you,  as  if  God  were  to 
be  its  witness." 

We  have  also  the  picture  of  his  own  sufferings, 
whilst  the  effects  of  that  remonstrance  were  yet  in 
doubt,  —  all  the  symptoms  of  a  sensitive  mind  that 
can  consent  to  give  pain  even  to  the  guilty  only  be- 
cause the  highest  Truth  and  the  highest  Love  require 
it,  —  the  inward  suspense  and  fear,  —  the  outward 
restlessness  and  change  of  scene  until  the  anxiety 
was  removed,  —  the  hurried  sending  of  one  messen- 
ger after  another,  —  the  deep  thankfulness  when  the 
assurance  came,  thafe-he  had  touched  and  purified  the 
evil,  without  wounding  or  embittering  the  heart.* 
There  is  a  remarkable  expression  in  the  ninth  verse, 
showing  the  sense  that  St.  Paul  entertained  of  the 
injurious,  and  even  corrupting,  effects  that  might  at- 

*  See  page  261. 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.'  337 

tend  moral  interferences  not  conceived  in  the  purest 
spirit:  —  "Now  I  rejoice,  not  that  ye  were  grieved, 
but  that  ye  sorrowed  to  repentance  :  for  ye  were 
grieved  after  a  godly  manner,  so  that  ye  have  received 
no  damage  from  me,  in  any  respectP  No  wonder  that, 
with  that  tender  respect  for  Humanity,  his  pure  and 
healing  influences  excited  no  hostile  and  counteract- 
ing passions,  and  stirred  only  that  spiritual  sorrow 
which  renews  the  heart :  "  The  Sorrow  that  has  re- 
lation to  God  worketh  a  renewal  of  the  soul  unto 
Salvation,  never  to  be  repented  of,  —  but  the  Sor- 
row that  has  relations  only  to  the  "World  worketh 
death." 

Here  is  the  whole  spiritual  philosophy  of  Contri- 
tion in  a  few  pregnant  words;  —  its  uses  and  abuses 
marked  with  a  distinctness  in  the  separating  line,  of 
which  moral  subjects  rarely  admit,  and  which  only  a 
master's  hand  can  draw.  The  Sorrow  that  brings 
the  heart  into  relations  with  God,  is  his  healing  mes- 
senger, drawing  closer  our  communion  with  the 
Source  of  our  being,  and  leading  to  that  Repentance, 
which  is  only  another  name  for  a  new  and  diviner 
Life;  —  w^hilst  the  Sorrow  that  does  not  bring  the 
heart  into  healing  and  strengthening  relations  with 
God,  but  settles  on  the  worldly  aspects  of  our  Grief, 
calls  no  angel  Emotion  to  unbar  our  prison  doors, 
but  leaves  us  to  ourselves  in  that  hour  of  woe  and 
weakness,  —  alone  with  our  humiliation,  our  dark- 
ness, our  anguish,  and  our  sin.  The  Sorrows  which 
the  same  Affliction  awakens  may  be  so  absolutely 
different  in  kind,  as  to  have  nothing  moral  in  com- 
mon.     It  may  be  the  godly   Sorrow  that  restores 

29 


338  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

spiritual  Life :  it  may  be  the  Sorrow  whose  eye  is 
on  the  World,  that  sinks  in  moral  Death. 

The  sorrow  of  Conscience :  Is  it  affected  most  by 
our  altered  relations  to  the  World,  or  by  a  new  view 
of  our  relations  to  God  ?  Does  ii  arise  from  a  sense 
of  outward  evils  entailed  upon  us,  or  from  a  sense  of 
what  we  are  within  ?  Is  it  only  the  burning  shame 
of  exposure,  —  the  agony  of  disgrace,  —  remorse  for 
the  forfeiture  of  reputation, —  and  self-contempt  for 
all  the  folly  that  has  involved  us  in  this  social  humil- 
iation and  loss  ;  —  or  is  it  the  deep  sense  of  inward 
unworthiness,  the  consciousness  of  an  abused,  dis- 
honored, injured  Nature,  —  a  grief  of  the  spirit  for  its 
own  weakness,  unfaithfulness,  self-abandonment  to 
evil  ?  In  the  one  case,  it  is  a  sorrow  that  reunites 
the  soul  to  God, — in  the  other,  that  leaves  it  with 
the  World. 

Again,  the  sorrow  of  Adversity :  Does  it  look  to 
the  worldly,  or  to  the  spiritual  aspects  of  a  changed 
condition  ?  Is  it  for  the  loss  of  outward  prosperity, 
honors,  influence,  position,  —  or  does  it  regard  an 
abridged  power  of  moral  action  and  spiritual  culture  ? 
Does  it  brood  over  the  external  circumstances,  as 
cause  and  consequence,  or  does  it  lift  itself  up  to  see 
the  hand  and  will  of  God,  as  its  ordaining  Source  ? 
In  the  one  case,  it  is  a  Sorrow  that  worketh  abject- 
ness  and  prostration  of  spirit ;  in  the  other,  that  leads 
to  an  experimental  knowledge  of  the  divinest  Truths, 
—  that  "  a  man's  life  consisteth  not  in  the  abun- 
dance of  the  things  that  he  possesseth,"  —  that  "  man 
lives  not  by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  pro- 
ceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of  God." 


II.    COR.    CHAP.    VII.  339 

Again,  the  sorrow  of  Bereavement :  Is  it  selfish- 
ness, or  tenderness  ?  Is  it  anguish,  or  is  it  love  ? 
Does  it  centre  on  the  outward  and  worldly  change, 
and  the  personal  loss  ?  Is  it  the  rebellion,  or  the  de- 
votion of  the  heart  ?  Is  it  too  feeble  and  earthly  to 
be  constant,  in  all  outward  change,  and  to  draw  liv- 
ing emotions  and  support  from  an  unseen  being  ? 
Or,  does  it  contemplate  the  spiritual  facts,  and  fill  the 
lonely  heart  with  the  images  of  Heaven,  and  breathe 
its  air  ?  In  the  one  case,  it  is  the  Sorrow  of  the 
World  that  leaves  "  the  dead  to  bury  their  dead  " ; 

—  in  the  other,  it  is  a  divine  Affection,  drawn  from 
the  Source  of  Love  and  Goodness  who  has  given  us 
the  earnest  of  His  spirit,  and  sanctified  by  the  faith 
"that  there  are  no  dead,  for  that  all  live  unto  God." 

And  the  signs  of  a  Sorrow  derived  from  a  sense 
of  our  true  relations  to  God  are,  that  it  is  a  Sorrow 
that  has  Fruits;  it  is  not  remorse,  but  Repentance, 

—  not  despair  and  dull  death,  but  new  Life ;  it  be- 
longs to  a  changed  heart  abjuring  its  former  self,  and 
"  working  carefulness,  fear,  struggle,  vehement  desire, 
unsparing  self-punishment,  and  retribution." 

And  whoever  would  awaken  these  saving  emo- 
tions in  a  lapsed  Nature,  must  treat  it  with  the  Apos- 
tle's reverence,  and  approach  it  with  the  generous 
Trust  that  inspires  the  sense  of  Power.  To  some  of 
us  there  may  appear  a  tone  of  exaggeration  in  St. 
Paul's  address  to  these  unconfirmed  penitents :  "  I 
rejoice  that  I  have  now  confidence  in  you  in  all 
things  "  ;  — but  this  is  the  spirit  that  reaches  a  heart 
that  has  any  thing  noble  in  it,  and  produces  new 
effort  and  watchfulness,  rather  than  unjustifiable  Self- 
Reliance. 


840  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

And  there  can  be  no  spiritual  healing  without 
some  Self-Reliance  ;  and  the  best  part  of  Salvation 
has  regard  not  so  much  to  the  height  of  our  attain- 
ments as  to  the  soundness  of  the  Heart,  the  trust 
we  can  now  repose  in  our  honest  desire  for  Refor- 
mation. 

And  thus,  not  spiritual  healing,  but  corruption 
dark  and  stern,  may  be  occasioned  even  by  the  Truth, 
if  unaccompanied  by  the  Love  that  awakens  some 
saving  emotions  in  the  Heart.  And  thus  a  man 
may  sin,  most  deeply,  in  uttering  even  merited  re- 
bukes ;  he  may  administer  moral  lessons  of  unques- 
tionable Truth  with  a  poisonous  effect ;  and,  by  the 
rudeness  and  hardness  of  his  touch,  turn  even  the 
germs  of  new  life  in  the  soul  into  deadly  roots  of  bit- 
terness. And  thus,  in  all  parts  of  Character,  Chris- 
tianity requires  us  to  act  with  the  presence  of  all  our 
forces,  with  a  union  of  contrasted  qualities.  And  to 
be  equal  to  the  divine  work  of  moral  healing  upon 
Earth,  one  must  be  in  the  spirit  of  the  Master,  full 
of  grace  as  of  truth,  —  with  something  of  the  blended 
Goodness  and  Severity  of  God  himself,  —  so  as  to 
speak  the  Truth  in  Love,  to  yield  no  Principle,  yet 
lose  no  Sympathy,  —  to  "  corrupt  no  man,"  by  Speech 
or  Silence,  and  yet  stir  no  emotion  less  sanctifying 
and  gentle  than  "  the  godly  Sorrow  that  leadeth  to 
Repentance." 


PART   II. 

(chaps.    VIII. -IX.) 

ST.  PAUL  URGES  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH  TO 
DISCHARGE  THE  FULL  DUTIES  OF  BROTH- 
ERLY  LOVE  TOWARDS  THEIR  AFFLICT- 
ED   BRETHREN    OF    JERUSALEM. 
THE  LAW  OF  GIVING. 


29* 


PART  II. 

ST.  PAUL  URGES  THE  CORINTHIAN  CHURCH  TO  DIS- 
CHARGE THE  FULL  DUTIES  OF  BROTHERLY  LOVE 
TOWARDS  THEIR  AFFLICTED  BRETHREN  OF  JERU- 
SALEM. —  THE  LAW  OF  GIVING. 


CHAPS.  YIII.,1X. 

VIII.  1.    Now,  brethren,  we  make  known  to  you  the  grace 

2  of  God  given  in  the  Churches  of  Macedonia,  —  that  in  a 
great  trial  of  affliction  the  overflowing  of  their  joy,  and 
from  its  depth  their  poverty,  abounded  in  the  riches  of 

3  their  single-mindedness.  For  according  to  their  power,  I 
bear  witness,  and  beyond  their  power,  they  were  wiUing  of 

4  themselves,  —  praying   us  with  much  entreaty  for   this 

5  favor  and  fellowship  in  the  assistance  of  the  saints ;  and 
not  according  as  we  expected,  but  first  they  gave  them- 

6  selves  to  God,  and  to  us  by  the  will  of  God.  So  that  we 
desired   Titus,  that  as  he  had  begun,  so  also  he  would 

7  finish  among  you,  this  work  of  grace  also.  And  as  ye 
abound  in  all  things,  in  faith,  in  word,  in  knowledge,  and 
in  all  zeal,  and  in  your  love  towards  us,  that  so  also  ye 

8  may  abound  in  this  grace.  I  speak  not  by  commandment, 
but  on  account  of  the  zeal  of  others,  and   to  prove  the 

9  genuineness  of  your  love.  For  ye  know  the  grace  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  how  for  your  sakes  he  became 


844  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

poor,  being  rich,  that  ye  by  his  poverty  might  be  rich. 

10  And  herein  I  give  my  advice,  for  this  is  expedient  for 
you  who  have  begun  before  not  only  to  do,  but  also  to 

11  be  in  forwardness,  a  year  ago.  Now,  therefore,  perfect 
the  doing  of  it,  that  as  there  was  a  readiness  to  will,  so 
also  there  may  be  a  completion  of  it,  out  of  that  which  ye 

12  have.  For  if  there  be  first  a  willing  mind,  a  man  is  ac- 
cepted according  to  that  he  hath,  and  not  according  to 

13  that  he  hath  not.     Not,  indeed,  that  there  should  be  a  re- 

14  mission  to  others,  and  a  burden  on  you,  but  that  by  way 
of  equality,  now  in  this  time,  your  abundance  should 
supply  their  want,  that  their  abundance  likewise  should 
be  a  supply   for   your  want,  —  that  there   may  be   an 

15  equality.  As  it  is  written,  "  He  that  gathered  much  had 
nothing  over,  and  he  that  had  gathered  little  had  no  lack." 

16  But  thanks  be  to  God  who  put  this  same  earnest  care  for 

17  you  into  the  heart  of  Titus  :  that  indeed  he  accepted  the 
exhortation,  and  being  more  zealous,  of  his  own  accord 

18  he  went  unto  you.  And  we  have  sent  with  him  the 
Brother  whose  praise  in  the  Gospel  is  throughout  all  the 

19  Churches  :  and  not  that  only,  but  who  was  also  chosen 
by  the  churches  to  be  our  fellow-traveller  with  that  grace, 
administered  by  us  to  the  glory  of  the  Lord  himself,  and 

20  as  a  proof  of  our  readiness.  Taking  care  for  this,  that 
no  one  should  blame  us  in  this  abundance  which  is  ad- 

21  ministered  by  us:  Providing  for  things  honest  not  only  in 

22  the  sight  of  the  Lord,  but  also  in  the  sight  of  men.  And 
we  have  sent  with  them  our  brother  whom  we  have  often 
proved  in  many  things,  and  now  much  more  zealous,  be- 

23  cause  of  this  great  confidence  in  you.  Now,  with  regard 
to  Titus,  he  is  my  fellow,  and  my  fellow-worker  towards 
you  ;  —  and  the  brethren,  —  they  are  the  Apostles  of  the  , 

24  Churches,  the  glory  of  Christ.  Wherefore  show  to  them, 
in  the  face  of  the  Churches,  the  demonstration  of  your 
love,  and  of  our  boasting  on  your  account. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.5    IX.  345 

IX.  1.    But  indeed  it  is  superfluous  for  me  to  write  to  you 

2  concerning  this  ministering  to  the  saints.  For  I  know 
the  forwardness  of  your  minds,  for  which  I  boast  of  you 
to  the  Macedonians,  that  Achaia  was  ready  a  year  ago, 

3  and  your  zeal  has  stirred  up  very  many.  Yet  I  have 
sent  the  brethren,  that  our  boasting  of  you  in  this  matter 
should  not  be  made  vain,  —  that  ye  may  be  in  readiness, 

4  as  I  said  ye  were.  Lest  if  the  Macedonians  should  come 
with  me,  and  find  you  unprepared,  we,  not  to  say  ye,  should 

5  be  put  to  shame  for  this  same  confidence.  Therefore,  I 
thought  it  necessary  to  exhort  the  brethren,  that  they 
should  go  before  unto  you,  and  prepare  beforehand  this 
your  blessing  already  declared,  so  that  the  same  should 

6  be  ready  as  a  blessing,  and  not  as  an  extortion.  And  this 
I  say,  He  that  soweth  sparingly  shall  also  reap  sparingly, 
and  he  that  soweth  bountifully  shall  reap  also  bountifully. 

7  Let  each  man  give  according  as  he  purposeth  in  his 
heart,  not  regrettingly,  nor  constrainedly,  for  God  loveth 

8  a  cheerful  giver.  And  God  is  able  to  make  all  grace  re- 
dound towards  you,  that  in  all  things,  having  all    suffi- 

9  ciency,  ye  may  abound  to  every  good  work.  As  it  is 
written,  "  He  hath  dispersed  abroad  ;    he  hath  given  to 

10  the  poor:  his  righteousness  remaineth  for  ever."  Now 
he  that  supplieth  seed  to  the  sower  will  also  supply  bread 
for  you,  and  multiply  your  seed  sown,  and  increase  the 

11  fruits  of  your  righteousness  :  Being  enriched  in  all  things 
to  all  ingenuousness,  which  worketh  through  us  thanks- 

12  giving  to  God.  For  the  ministration  of  this  service  is  not 
only  supplying  the  wants  of  the  saints,  but  also  abounds 

13  in  many  thanksgivings  to  God.  Through  the  experience 
of  this  ministration  they  glorify  God  for  the  submission 
of  your  confession  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  and  for  the 
sincerity  of  your  fellowship  with  them  and  with  all  men, 

14  whilst  they  also  earnestly  long  after  you,  in  their  prayer 


346  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO     THE    CORINTHIANS. 

for  you,  on  account  of  the  exceeding  grace  of  God  in 
15  you.     Now  thanks  be  to  God  for  his  unspeakable  gift. 


We  obtain  the  richest  Lessons  in  moral  Wisdom, 
whenever  a  great  Mind  applies  itself  to  determine 
the  permanent  Principles  that  are  involved  in  some 
pressing,  practical  occasion.  We  then  get  the  Ideal 
of  Duty,  but  clear,  definite,  and  of  commanding' ob- 
ligation, because  exhibited  in  immediate  connection 
with  actual  affairs.  It  is  like  Christ's  sketch  from 
Life  in  answer  to  the  question,  "  But  who  is  my 
neighbor  ?  "  —  and  with  no  escape  from  the  closing 
appeal,  which  seems  to  proceed  out  of  the  circum- 
stances like  the  voice  of  Righteousness  itself :  "  Go 
thou,  and  do  likewise."  —  In  the  eighth  and  ninth 
chapters,  St.  Paul  sets  forth  the  spiritual  Laws  of 
Christian  Liberality ;  the  Principles  of  Action  which 
must  direct,  preserve,  and  ripen  its  impulses,  that 
they  may  bear  their  best  fruit.  The  special  occasion 
was  the  sympathy  of  the  Gentile  Churches  with  the 
Poverty  and  peculiar  afflictions  of  the  Parent  Church 
at  Jerusalem,  —  the  source  of  their  own  spiritual 
riches,  —  and  the  Duties  of  that  Sympathy. 

A  year  before,  when  St.  Paul  was  closing  his 
First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  he  had  commended 
to  their  charitable  care  the  poorer  brethren  at  Jeru- 
salem, and  given  directions  as  to  the  manner  in 
which  their  Benefaction  should  accumulate.  On  the 
first  day  of  each  week,  a  contribution,  proportionate 
to  the  prosperity  which  God  had  given,  was  to  be 
laid  apart.  —  Jerusalem  must  have  stood  out  before 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  347 

the  imagination  of  a  converted  Heathen  as  the  City 
of  God,  venerable  in  holiness  and  privilege,  —  and 
to  provide  for  its  necessities  a  pious  duty,  a  dear 
service,  —  such  as  in  all  ages  the  strong  hands  and 
hearts  of  the  world  have  regarded  the  office  of  min- 
istering to  the  wants  of  those,  from  whose  supposed 
sacredness  and  devotedness  of  life  has  been  derived 
the  knowledge  of  spiritual  and  eternal  things,  —  the 
Sages,  Priests,  and  Prophets  of  Mankind.  More 
venerable  than  Delphi  to  the  Greek,  might  well  ap- 
pear Zion  to  the  converted  Gentile;  and  even  an 
enthusiasm  of  Charity  and  Self-Devotion  be  nothing 
more  than  natural  to  those  thus  brought  into  living 
relations  with  that  "  Oracle  of  God,"  when  told  that 
"  the  Saints  "  of  the  Mystic  City,  the  brethren  and 
disciples  of  the  Lord,  their  own  Teachers  and  Fa- 
thers in  the  Faith,  were  in  poverty  and  persecution. 
From  the  beginning,  this  connection  had  existed 
between  the  mother  and  the  daughter  Churches. 
When  Paul  and  Barnabas  w^ent  up  to  Jerusalem 
from  Antioch  to  consult  on  Christian  Union  and 
Gentile  Liberty,  they  were  charged,  as  a  sign  of  the 
Brotherhood  of  the  Churches,  that  they  should  re- 
member the  Poor.* 

The  zeal  of  the  Corinthians  in  this  service  of 
Brotherhood,  St.  Paul  now  instigates  by  the  exam- 
ple of  the  liberality  of  the  Macedonian  Churches, 
Philippi,  Thessalonica,  and  Berea.  He  had  sent  for- 
ward Titus,  and  other  representatives  of  the  Church- 
es,  to  take  charge  of  the  practical  details  ;  and  in 

*  Gal.  ii.  10. 


348  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

these  two  Chapters  he  unfolds  and  enforces  the  duty 
and  the  principles  of  Christian  sympathy  between 
Church  and  Church,  nation  and  nation,  man  and 
man,  as  members  of  one  spiritual  Family.  He  hints 
at  the  comparative  poverty  of  Macedonia,  and  then 
records,  as  an  example,  their  eminent  generosity. 
The  merit  of  this  was  increased  by  their  great 
and  recent  sufferings  on  account  of  their  profession 
of  Christianity :  "  In  a  great  trial  of  affliction  their 
spiritual  joy,  and  out  of  its  depths  their  poverty  still 
overflowed  and  brought  forth  the  riches  of  Single- 
mindednessy  This  benevolent  spirit  St.  Paul  calls 
the  "grace  of  God,  bestowed  on  the  Churches  of  Ma- 
cedonia," the  fruit  of  His  most  signal  favor  and 
presence  in  their  hearts.  So  is  every  good  disposi- 
tion, the  best  and  greatest  of  His  gifts.  This  is  the 
true  Christian  sentiment :  "  Not  unto  us,  O  Lord, 
not  unto  us,  but  unto  Thy  name  give  glory,  for  Thy 
goodness  and  Thy  truth's  sake!" — We  ^re  most 
richly  blessed  by  God  when  He  puts  it  into  our 
hearts  to  do  and  to  wish  Good ;  a  blessing  infinitely 
greater  than  the  means  of  doing  so  with  which  He 
has  endowed  us.  We  have  already  received  more 
at  God's  hands  in  the  disposition  to  give,  than  any 
brother  can  in  the  external  gift  that  we  communi- 
cate. 

1.  The  source  of  this  disposition  in  the  Macedo- 
nians is  indicated  in  that  word,  in  the  second  verse, 
so  unhappily  translated  "  liberahty.'^ —  In  their  "  Sin- 
gle-mindedness^^  they  adopted  the  doctrines  and  prin- 
ciples of  the  Gospel  as  realities  of  the  Heart,  —  they 
entered  into  the  spirit  of  Christian  Union  and  Broth- 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  349 

erhood,  —  in  the  Apostles'  language,  they  "gave 
themselves  to  the  Lord."  We  are  not  now  discuss- 
ing the  Political  Economy  of  Alms,  but  the  actual 
effects  Christian  principles  would  produce  on  hearts 
possessed  by  the  Gospel  sentiment,  if  they  believed 
that  Brethren  were  in  destitution. 

St.  Paul  calls  every  motive  into  play,  by  stating 
that  he  would  not  wish  the  Corinthians  to  be  infe- 
rior to  any  other  Church  in  such  gifts :  and  we  may 
provoke  one  another  to  good  works.  He  hints  also, 
that,  as  they  made  no  slight  pretensions  to  other  dis- 
tinctions, they  should  not  be  deficient  in  this  the 
crowning  gift.  ( VIII.  7.)  Yet  he  takes  not  away  the 
grace  of  their  benevolence  by  spoiling  its  spontane- 
ous character ;  he  only  fans  the  flame  that  was  self- 
kindled,  by  the  warming  breath  of  sympathy  with 
the  active  goodness  of  others.  He  tells  them  that 
he  had  himself  made  use  of  their  own  readiness  in 
order  to  kindle  the  flame  in  Macedonia,  —  that  their 
zeal  had  stirred  up  many,  —  and  that  he  had  even 
boasted  of  their  promptitude,  so  that  his  own  credit 
was  now  involved  in  the  zealous  completion  of  their 
liberality.   (IX.  2-5.) 

2.  (VIH.  8,  9.)  He  affirms  the  principle  that 
their  zeal  in  this  cause  would  test  the  degree  of  re- 
ality in  which  they  had  embraced  the  doctrine  of 
Jesus,  who  identified  himself  with  all  mankind,  and 
therefore  became  poor  and  rejected  of  men,  as  the 
Universal  Saviour,  when  he  might  have  been  rich 
and  accepted  as  the  Jewish  Messiah.  Beautiful  ar- 
gument for  Christian  Mercy,  when  addressed  to  Gen- 
tile Churches  !     That  they  should  now  identify  them- 

30 


350  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

selves  with  the  Jewish  Christians,  and,  in  the  senti- 
ment of  their  spiritual  brotherhood,  forget  their  Na- 
tionality,—  even  as  Christ  had  divested  himself  of 
Jewish  glory,  that  he  might  identify  himself  with 
Humankind.  "  Ye  know  the  grace  of  our  Lord  Je- 
sus Christ,  that  though  he  was  rich,  for  your  sakes 
he  became  poor,  that  ye  by  his  poverty  might  be 
rich."  These  words  have  no  relation  to  a  preexist- 
ent  state.  He  was  rich  as  God's  Christ ;  and  if  he 
had  consented  to  be  the  Jewish  Messiah,  —  if  he 
had  followed  the  suggestion  of  the  Tempter,  —  from 
the  pinnacle  of  the  Temple  looked  down  upon  the 
Jewish  world  as  his  Messianic  realm,  and  descended 
among  them  as  the  expected  Deliverer,  —  would 
have  had  a  ^Monarch's  place ;  and  his  poverty,  and 
rejection  in  this  world,  were  the  consequences  of  his 
faithful  purpose  to  be  the  spiritual  Saviour  of  Man- 
kind. You  will  observe  that  St.  Paul,  writing  to 
Gentiles,  says,  —  "  It  was  for  your  sakes  he  became 
Poor."  And  it  is  always  in  this  connection  with 
Gentile  Redemption,  that  mention  is  made  of  the 
Humiliation  of  our  Lord.  He  was  rejected  of  the 
Jew  for  the  Gentile's  sake.  He  would  not  sit  upon 
that  narrow,  theocratic  Throne.  He  would  not  be 
the  Son  of  David  ;  he  must  be  the  Son  of  Man,  and 
the  Son  of  God. 

3.  (Verses  10,  11.)  He  states  it  as  a  Rule,  and 
Principle  of  Love,  that  we  should  complete,  and 
accomplish  without  hazardous  delay,  the  merciful 
projects  of  the  Heart.  What  the  impulse  of  Mercy 
prompts  to  be  done,  can  with  no  safety,  and  with 
no  faithfulness,  be  put  off: — "You  have  been  in 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  351 

forwardness  a  year  ago,  and  now  it  is  expedient  for 
you,  that  you  perfect  the  doing  of  it."  Many  a  char- 
itable design  comes  to  nothing,  —  many  a  kind  feel- 
ing and  purpose  bears  no  fruit.  The  heart  urges, 
and  gives  its  ready  pledge  ;  —  but  something  inter- 
poses, and  its  counsels  come  to  naught;  and  that 
they  may  not  come  to  naught,  the  good  deed  should 
be  put  in  train,  and  if  possible  be  perfected  whilst 
yet  the  heart  is  warm.  How  many  right  designs, 
and  brotherly  projects,  has  delay  ruined  !  There  is 
no  wilful  insincerity  ;  —  but  we  have  delayed,  — 
and  meanwhile  the  feeling  has  cooled,  and  other  in- 
terests have  intervened.  Sufficient  for  each  day  is 
the  good  thereof,  equally  as  the  evil.  "We  must  do 
at  once,  and  with  our  might,  the  merciful  deed  that 
our  hand  findeth  to  do,  —  else  it  will  never  be  done, 
for  the  hand  will  find  other  tasks,  and  the  arrears  fall 
through.  And  every  unconsummated  good  feeling, 
every  unfulfilled  purpose  that  His  spirit  has  prompt- 
ed, shall  one  day  charge  us  as  faithless  and  recreant 
before  God.  "  Now  therefore  finish  the  doing  of  it, 
that,  as  there  was  a  readiness  to  will,  so  there  may 
be  a  performance  also  out  of  that  which  ye  have." 

4.  (Ver.  12.)  For  the  willing  mind  which  accom- 
plishes what  it  can,  is  that  which  God  accepts.  It 
is  not  the  material  part,  but  the  spiritual  part,  of 
Charity  that  God  regards.  Do  what  you  can, — 
give  what  you  have.  Only  stop  not  with  feelings; 
—  carry  your  Charity  into  deeds ;  do  and  give 
what  costs  you  something;  —  if  nothing  else,  con- 
tribute your  honest  sympathy  with  another's  Joy, — 
your  unaffected  tears  for  another's  Grief.     If  Charity 


352  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

was  accepted  only  according  to  its  external  gifts, 
the  Poor  would  be  deprived  of  this  peculiar  grace. 
But  the  Poorest,  according  to  the  Beatitude,  may 
have  as  much  of  the  Joy  of  beneficence,  of  the  King- 
dom of  Heaven,  in  their  spirit,  as  the  richest  and 
the  greatest;  for  it  is  the  sincerity  of  the  working 
sentiment  that  is  accepted  and  blessed,  and  small 
service  and  offering  from  them  is  often  more  than 
the  wealthiest  have  the  power  to  give.  Indeed,  so 
far  as  wealth  is  the  instrument  of  Charity,  where  it 
exists  in  great  abundance  it  takes  from  the  power  of 
making  sacrifices,  except  in  those  cases,  unhappily 
not  rare,  when  the  Wealthy  are  blighted  and  blinded 
by  narrow-heartedness  and  the  fear  of  Poverty,  and 
then  they  lose  the  power,  by  losing  the  will:  —  but 
the  Poor  take  their  gifts  out  of  their  own  comforts, 
often  out  of  their  own  necessities  ;  —  "  they  give  their 
mites,  even  all  that  they  have."  If  the  Poor  tend  a 
sick  friend  or  neighbor,  they  take  it  from  their  rest, 
and  add  it  to  their  already  excessive  toil,  whilst  the 
rich  man  sends  hired  care,  and  never  feels  the  sacri- 
fice. If  they  take  an  orphan  child,  as  they  often  do, 
into  their  narrow  homes,  it  is  to  share  their  poverty 
and  make  it  poorer,  to  feel  the  daily  pressure  of  an- 
other's maintenance  at  their  scanty  board,  whilst  the 
rich  man,  who  does  such  deeds,  contributes  to  its 
support,  and  is  unhampered  by  its  existence  in  purse, 
privacy,  or  comfort.  And  they  are  the  Poor  who 
mainly  nourish  the  Poor.  The  rich  man's  bounty 
falls,  occasionally,  in  overflowing  abundance,  like  a 
sudden  shower;  but  the  sympathy  of  the  Poor  for 
one  another  is  the  ever-falling  dew.     And  in  this  is 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  353 

the  Promise  fulfilled  :  "  Blessed  are  the  Poor,  in  spir- 
it, for  theirs  is  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven."  God 
makes  all  men  equal  in  the  opportunities  of  the  di- 
vinest  joys. 

"  Man  is  dear  to  man :  the  poorest  poor 
Long  for  some  moments,  in  a  weary  life, 
When  they  can  know,  and  feel,  that  they  have  been 
Themselves  the  fathers,  and  the  dealers  out 
Of  some  small  blessings  ;  —  have  been  kind  to  such 
As  needed  kindness;  for  this  single  cause, 
That  we  have,  all  of  us,  one  human  heart." 

5.  (Ver.  13-15.)  Again,  St.  Paul  urges  no  ex- 
travagance of  Charity.  He  states  that  there  is  no 
obligation  on  any  one  to  reduce  himself  to  destitu- 
tion, that  others  may  live  at  ease ;  —  but  that  still  it 
is  the  mission  of  Christian  Principle  and  Love  to 
tend  to  that  Equality,  which  the  physical  Laws  of 
the  Universe  do  not  produce :  "  I  mean  not  that  oth- 
ers be  eased  and  ye  burdened  :  but  that,  by  way  of 
equality,  your  abundance  may  at  this  time  be  a  sup- 
ply for  their  want,  and  their  abundance  also  may  at 
another  time  be  a  supply  for  your  want;  so  that 
there  may  be  equality,  as  it  is  written,  '  He  that 
gathered  much  had  nothing  over,  and  he  that  gath- 
ered little  had  no  lack.'  "  We  are  often  tempted  to 
say,  when  we  look  upon  the  inequality  of  human 
condition.  Is  God  impartial  ?  Is  He  an  equal  Fa- 
ther ?  —  Is  the  Gospel  Doctrine  true  ?  But  we  should 
rather  ask.  Have  ive  acted  as  the  children  of  that 
equal  Father  ?  Are  the  marks  of  His  Spirit  upon 
us  ?  Have  we  recognized  our  Brotherhood  ?  God's 
object  in  this  life  is  not,  by  material  distributions 
and  measurements,   to    exhibit  His   own    Paternal 

30* 


354  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Character  in  unclouded  Light,  but  to  educate  our 
spiritual  Nature,  and  to  train  to  perfect  action  our 
filial  and  fraternal  Love.  Christian  men  ought  to 
adjust  what,  for  this  very  purpose,  God  has  left  une- 
qual. The  means  are  given,  and  nothing  is  wanting 
but  the  Brother's  Heart :  and  if  the  Brother's  Heart 
is  wanting,  shall  we  charge  the  inequality  upon  the 
Universal  Father  ?  He  has  given  enough  for  all,  but 
His  children  must  care  for  each  other,  and  be  the 
stewards  and  distributors  of  His  Bounty.  If  God 
produced  the  works  and  results  of  Love  and  Wis- 
dom by  His  own  acts  of  power,  where  would  be 
the  Education  of  the  human  Soul?  If  God  daily 
dropped  our  rations  out  of  Heaven,  what  would  be- 
come of  human  energy,  —  what  of  human  self- 
denial  and  love  ?  Our  souls  are  trained  and  per- 
fected through  our  bodily  conditions.  He  spreads 
the  feast  over  the  all-nourishing  Earth, —  but  Brother 
must  distribute  to  Brother,  or  teach  him  to  collect 
his  portion  for  himself.  As  He  cast  the  Manna  on 
the  Desert,  and  though  some  gathered  more,  and 
some  less,  according  to  their  opportunity,  yet,  when 
Distribution  was  made,  enough  was  found  for  all, — 
so  with  that  unfailing  Manna  which  His  bounteous 
hand  spreads  around  us  every  day.  Some  gather 
more,  —  some  less,  —  some  none,  according  to  oppor- 
tunity, talents,  health,  advantages,  natural  or  ac- 
quired :  all  these  are  His  gifts,  —  and  shall  the  spirit- 
ual Grace  alone  be  wanting  that  would  lead  all,  by 
help  or  instigation,  to  the  attainment  of  their  share  ? 
It  is  not  by  material  impartialities  and  uniformi- 
ties that  God  shows  Himself  in  intimate  paternal 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  355 

connections  with  Man  :  —  it  is  by  giving  us  of  His 
own  spirit  that  this  is  most  fully  manifested,  by  im- 
parting the  ruling  principles  of  His  own  Nature ;  — 
and  the  obscure  and  destitute  in  whom  the  Heart  of 
Love  is  warm,  is  more  God's  Child,  is  more  favored, 
and  partially  treated,  by  God,  than  the  prosperous, 
or  the  great,  who  are  not  united  to  Him  by  this  kin- 
dred bond,  by  this  true  affinity  of  Nature  and  Be- 
atitude. 

This,  then,  is  the  quality,  the  gift  and  grace  of 
God,  that  we  should  strive  first  to  equalize.  If  we 
could  give  something  of  a  right  Heart,  all  other  giv- 
ings  would  follow  in  their  course.  And  this  is  the 
great  moral  mission  of  social  and  individual  Man, 
in  the  infinite  variety  of  their  aptitudes  and  situa- 
tions,—  each  to  his  work,  with  his  own  weapons. 
Some  are  to  equalize  God's  gifts  by  warring  with 
the  oppression,  the  monopoly,  the  injustice,  that  re- 
strain and  confine  His  natural  Bounty.  Others  are 
to  equalize  God's  gifts,  not  by  warring  with  the 
wrongdoer,  for  which  they  may  have  no  fitness  or 
faculty,  but  by  sympathy  with  the  wronged,  by  the 
tender  spirit  of  Mercy,  repairing  in  a  measure  by 
individual  Beneficence  the  evils  of  Society.  Some 
are  to  equalize  God's  gifts  by  extending  Education, 
awakening  the  self-reverencing  Mind,  giving  to  it  the 
spiritual  armor  that  is  mighty  to  pull  down  iniquity, 
and  all  sense  of  degradation.  Some  are  to  equalize 
God's  gifts  by  spreading  the  Gospel,  by  preaching 
Christ  to  the  Poor, —  exalting  the  Valleys  and  making 
low  the  Hills,  that  the  Glory  of  the  Lord  may  be 
revealed,  and  all  Flesh   see  it  together  from  those 


356  SECOND     EPISTLE     TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

spiritual  heights  that  command  a  vision  of  our  Im- 
mortality. And  some  are  to  equalize  God's  gifts,  by 
showing  how  deeply  this  spirit  has  penetrated  to 
their  own  hearts ;  by  exhibiting  in  their  own  demean- 
or, in  all  the  intercourses  of  Life,  the  example  of  a 
Christian  estimation  of  our  Brethren,  of  the  Honor 
due  to  all  men.  In  all  these  ways  is  the  blessed 
Mission  of  Humanity  carried  on  ;  —  and  if  all  work) 
in  their  own  spheres  and  aptitudes,  there  will  be 
realized  all  the  Equality  that  spiritual  man  is  con- 
cerned to  see.  The  very  Child  does  something  to 
equalize  God's  gifts,  when  it  reawakens  the  fading 
sense  of  youth  and  buoyant  happiness  in  older 
hearts;  or  when,  at  a  later  age,  by  obedience  and 
respect,  and  careful  love,  it  compensates  the  toils, 
and  lightens  the  load  of  life,  —  even  as  the  Mother 
is  equalizing  the  gifts  of  God  when  sheltering  the 
helplessness  of  infancy,  or  dropping  gentle  wisdom 
into  its  unstored  heart.  Woman  is  equalizing  the 
gifts  of  God  by  interweaving  with  manly  life  gentle 
thoughtfulness,  domestic  holiness,  a  tender  refine- 
ment, and  ideal  grace ;  and  Man  is  but  acknowledg- 
ing the  debt,  and  contributing  to  equality,  when 
sharing  with  her  the  products  of  his  Strength,  his 
Patience,  his  Genius,  or  his  Toil.  To  each  man  has 
God  given  some  peculiar  gift,  for  the  enriching  of  all 
the  rest.  And  it  is  the  Christian  sentiment  alone, 
the  sense  of  spiritual  relations,  that  directs  all  these 
Gifts  to  the  centre  of  the  common  Good,  that  unites 
these  various  Missions  for  one  End,  and  brings  to- 
gether, for  purposes  of  equalization,  the  poor  and  the 
rich,  the  young  and  the  old,  the  strong  and  the  weak, 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.  VIII.,   IX.  357 

the  sound-hearted  and  the  broken-hearted,  the  cap- 
tive and  the  free. 

6.  (VIII.  16-24.)  St.  Paul  carefully  divests 
himself  of  all  personal  interest  in  the  Bounty  of  the 
Churches.  He  associates  others  with  himself,  both 
in  its  collection  and  in  its  distribution,  and  he  refuses 
to  undertake  the  responsibility  without  inspection 
and  control.  Here  is  a  great  example :  here  is  the 
rarest  of  unions,  —  the  mixture  of  Prudence  and  En- 
thusiasm. This  should  be  a  Principle  with  all  irien 
in  matters  of  Trust.  We  should  put  our  Integrity 
into  safe  Custody.  No  man  should  lay  himself  open 
to  a  possible  temptation  of  unknown  power,  —  or 
feed  the  evil  spirit  of  suspicion  and  calumny  by  rash 
and  inconsiderate  self-exposure.  A  moral  Principle 
in  practical  affairs  is  here  indicated,  and  should  be 
religiously  observed.* — The  Brother  whose  praise 
was  in  all  the  Churches,  and  who  was  appointed  to 
travel  with  St.  Paul,  is  generally  supposed  to  be  St. 
Luke ;  but  his  Gospel,  which  is  made  the  grounds 
of  the  supposition,  was  not  written  at  this  time.  It 
is  impossible  to  know  who  the  two  companions  of 
Titus  were,  but  there  is  no  more  probable  conjecture 
than  that  they  were  Luke  and  Apollos. 

7.  (IX.  6.)  Another  principle  of  Charity  stated  in 
this  argument  is,  that  the  Law  of  Love  is  the  same 
as  the  Law  of  Labor.  As  is  the  sowing,  so  is  the 
reaping.  This  Law  is  mentioned  not  to  give  life  to 
the  sentiment,  which  cannot  be  created  by  such  cal- 
culations, —  but  to  lead  it  on  to  a  practical  accom- 
plishment, —  to  prevent  it  perishing  in  mere  feeling, 

*  See  pp.  243,  244. 


358  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

He  that  soweth  sparingly  shall  reap  sparingly,  —  and 
he  that  soweth  bountifully  shall  reap  bountifully. 
He  reaps  the  blessings  of  a  satisfied  benevolence,  — 
the  new  strength  given  to  the  sentiment  itself,  —  the 
harvest  of  healthy,  happy,  remunerating  sympathies 
that  spring  up  whenever  Benevolence  is  carried  into 
all  available  Action,  —  the  cheerful  views  of  Life, 
and  the  blessed  connections  which  the  Heart  whose 
love  works  outwardly  holds  even  with  the  sorrows 
that  it  heals.  Contrast  with  this  the  sickly  feeble- 
ness, the  discontent,  and  miseries,  of  inoperative 
Benevolence,  of  the  voluptuaries  of  feeling,  —  when 
the  Heart  is  not  justified  and  blessed  by  the  Con- 
science :  how  helpless  in  itself,  how  morbid,  weary- 
ing, and  offensive  to  others,  this  sentimental  sympa- 
thy !  In  sympathies,  as  in  moral  trials  and  difficulties, 
there  is  no  blessing  from  God,  except  upon  the  Doer 
of  the  work.  Christ's  Picture  of  the  Judgment  is 
drawn  from  the  contrasted  harvests  to  be  gathered 
by  those  who  sow  their  sympathies  in  the  furrows  of 
human  wants  and  woes,  and  by  those  who  kill  them 
by  Self-love,  or  fastidiously  preserve  them  in  a  Nap- 
kin. "  Then  shall  the  King  say  unto  them  on  his 
right  hand,  Come,  ye  blessed  of  my  Father,  and 
inherit  the  Kingdom  prepared  for  you ;  for  I  was  an 
hungered  and  ye  gave  me  meat,  —  I  was  thirsty  and 
ye  gave  me  drink,  —  I  was  a  stranger  and  ye  took 
me  in,  —  naked  and  ye  clothed  me,  —  I  was  sick 
and  ye  visited  me,  —  I  was  in  prison  and  ye  came 
unto  me.  Then  shall  the  righteous  answer  him, 
saying.  Lord,  when  saw  we  thee  an  hungered  and 
fed  thee  ?   or  thirsty  and  gave  thee  drink  ?  —  when 


11.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.,    IX.  359 

saw  we  thee  a  stranger  and  took  thee  in  ?  or  naked 
and  clothed  thee?  —  or  when  saw  we  thee  sick  or  in 
prison,  and  came  unto  thee  ?  And  the  King  shall 
answer,  Verily,  I  say  unto  you.  Inasmuch  as  ye  have 
done  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these  my  brethren, 
ye  have  done  it  unto  me.  Then  shall  they,  on  the 
left  hand,  answer  him,  saying.  Lord,  when  saw  we 
thee  an  hungered,  or  athirst,  or  a  stranger,  or  naked, 
or  sick,  or  in  prison,  and  did  not  minister  unto  thee  ? 
Then  shall  he  answer  them.  Verily,  I  say  unto  you, 
Inasmuch  as  ye  did  it  not  to  one  of  the  least  of 
these,  ye  did  it  not  to  meP 

St.  Paul  even  refers  to  the  temporal  blessing  which 
by  natural  and  beautiful  consequence  is  often  shed 
on  free  and  abounding  Love,  —  increasing  its  basket 
and  its  store,  so  that  the  generous  hand  is  refilled 
by  God.  He  quotes  a  single  verse  of  the  112th 
Psalm,  —  the  whole  of  which  is  to  the  same  pur- 
port :  "  He  hath  scattered  his  blessings ;  he  hath 
given  to  the  poor ;  his  goodness  shall  endure  for 
ever,  —  his  horn  shall  be  exalted  with  honor." 

8.  Another  Rule  and  Principle  of  Christian  Char- 
ity, stated  in  the  seventh  verse  of  the  ninth  chapter, 
is,  that  in  these  interests  the  Heart  is  our  Counsellor : 
"  Let  every  one  give  as  he  purposeth  in  his  heartP 
The  instincts  of  the  Heart  are  to  be  reverently  re- 
garded, —  and  its  dictates  to  be  submitted  to  no 
revisal,  except  that  of  its  wiser,  purer,  and  more  con- 
scientious self.  The  Heart  to  the  Christian,  is  what 
Genius  is  to  the  Intellectual  world.  It  is  the  inspi- 
ration of  the  Man, —  his  highest  utterance,  —  the 
very  blossoming  of  our  moral  Nature,  when  it  is  cul- 


860  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS, 

tivated,  and  carefully  guarded  from  external  stain 
and  injury.  Prudence,  Self-interest,  calculations  of 
lower  Expediency,  have  no  right  to  revise  or  reverse 
its  Dictates.  Only  a  higher,  wider,  and  more  far- 
seeing  Benevolence  should  control  instinctive  Be- 
nevolence. Only  the  Wisdom  of  Love  should  modify 
or  guide  its  impulse ;  and  no  faculty  but  that  of 
Conscience  is  qualified  to  give  a  direction  to  the 
Heart. 

If  we  give  under  any  guidance  or  revision  but  that 
of  Love  itself,  we  give  grudgingly,  —  and  God  loves 
a  cheerful  giver,  —  it  is  the  only  thing  in  our  work 
of  Charity  that  He  does  love,  —  for  what  in  His 
sight  is  the  outward  gift ! 

9.  (11  -  15.)  And  lastly,  it  is  declared  to  be  one  of 
the  operations,  and  beatitudes,  of  practical  Mercy, 
that  it  causeth  thanksgiving  to  God  ;  —  by  our 
means  it  makes  the  wretched  feel  that  God  cares  for 
them ;  —  it  introduces  them  into  His  family,  and 
gives  them  at  once  Brethren  and  a  Father.  In  this 
respect,  reversing  the  sentiment  of  the  Psalm,  our 
Goodness  extends  to  God,  as  well  as  to  the  saints 
that  be  upon  the  Earth. 

St.  Paul  trusted  that  the  influence  of  Gentile 
Liberality,  in  this  respect,  would  heal  the  one  great 
division  of  the  Early  Church,  —  that  it  would  recon- 
cile the  Jewish  Christian  to  his  Gentile  Brother, — 
inasmuch  as  it  would  show  experime^itally  the  bless- 
ed fruits  that  the  spirit  of  the  Gospel  could  produce 
and  ripen,  independently  of  ritual  and  ceremonial 
relations:  —  "By  the  experience  of  this  ministration, 
they  will  glorify   God  for  the  subjection  which  ye 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    VIII.5    IX.  361 

profess  unto  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  and  for  the  sincer- 
ity of  your  fellowship  with  them  and  with  all  men  ; 
earnestly  longing  also  after  you,  in  their  prayer  for 
you,  on  account  of  the  exceeding  grace  of  God  in 
you."  And  thus  should  all  religious  divisions  be 
healed,  —  and  thus  only  can  they  be  healed,  —  by 
that  unquestionable  evidence  which  the  life  of  Love 
can  give,  that  through  all  varieties  of  form  one  spirit 
breathes,  —  that  under  all  outward  differences  beats 
the  Brother's  heart ;  —  and  so  the  excellent  bond  of 
Charity  take  the  place  of  all  less  universal  less  spirit- 
ual, less  essential,  affinities  between  Man  and  Man, 
—  between  Man  and  God. 

Now  "  Thanks  be  to  God,"  says  St.  Paul,  contem- 
plating this  its  wide  and  blessed  operation,  "  for  his 
unspeakable  Gift !  "  —  for  this  Christian  sentiment 
that  makes  a  human  Brotherhood,  —  a  Universal 
Church,  —  identifying  general  with  individual  good. 
There  is  no  unity,  no  equality,  no  principle  of  last- 
ing peace  among  men,  except  this.  It  is  that  vital 
Love  which,  existing  in  God  Himself,  gave  birth  to 
the  Universe,  —  which  redeemed  it  and  created  it 
anew  in  Christianity,  —  and  which,  in  proportion  as 
it  spreads  through  human  hearts,  becomes  the  bond 
and  blessing  of  the  world.  To  have  it,  and  extend  it 
from  heart  to  heart,  is  our  Christian  Mission. 

"  A  new  Commandment  give  I  unto  you,  that  ye 
love  one  another."  "  Herein  is  my  Father  glorified, 
that  ye  bear  much  fruit :  so  shall  ye  be  my  dis- 
ciples." 

31 


PART    III. 

(chaps.    X. -XIII.) 

ST.  PAUL'S  CLOSING  VINDICATION 

OF   HIS 

APOSTOLIC    CHARACTER   AND    AUTHORITY 

AGAINST  HIS  DETRACTORS  AT  CORINTH. 


PART    III. 
(chapters  x.-xiii.) 


SECTION  I. 

ST.    Paul's    opponents.  —  his   personal    infirmities. — 

HIS     APOSTLESHIP     denied  :      ITS     WARRANTS.  HIS     DIS- 
INTERESTEDNESS MISCONSTRUED. SELF-COMMENDATION  : 

ITS    FOLLY,    AND    ITS    JUSTIFICATION. 


CHAPS.  X.,  XI. 

X.  1.    Now  I,  Paul,  who  in  presence  am  lowly  among  you, 

2  but  when  absent  am  bold  towards  you,  beseech  you  by 
the  meekness  and  gentleness  of  Christ ;  I  entreat  you  that, 
when  present,  I  may  not  be  bold  with  that  confidence 
wherewith  I  reckon  to  be  bold  against  those  who  reckon 

3  of  us  as  if  we  walked  according  to  the  flesh.     For  walk- 

4  ing  in  the  flesh,  we  do  not  war  according  to  the  flesh  :  for 
the  weapons  of  our  warfare  are  not  carnal,  but  mighty 

5  through  God  to  the  pulling  down  of  strongholds  :  casting 
down  imaginations,  and  every  high  thing  that  exalteth  it- 
self against  the  knowledge  of  God,  and  bringing  into  cap- 

6  tivity  every  thought  to  the  obedience  of  Christ ;  and  being 
ready  to  avenge  all  disobedience,  when  your  obedience  is 
completed. 

31* 


366  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

7  Consider  the  things  that  are  before  your  face.  If  any- 
one trust  in  himself  that  he  is  Christ's,  let  him  of  himself 
think  this  again,  that  as  he  is  Christ's,  so  also  are  we. 

8  For  if  I  should  boast  somewhat  more  of  our  power,  which 
the  Lord  hath  given  us  for  your  edification,  and  not  for 

9  your  destruction,  I  should  not  be  put  to   shame  :  that  I 

10  may  not  seem  as  if  I  would  terrify  you  by  Letters.  For 
his  Letters,  they  say,  are  weighty  and  powerful,  but  his 

11  bodily  presence  is  weak,  and  his  speech  of  no  account.  Let 
such  an  one  reckon  on  this,  that  such  as  we  are  in  word 
by  Letters  when  absent,  such  also  are  we,  when  present, 

12  in  deed  :  For  we  dare  not  to  rank,  nor  to  compare,  ourselves 
with  some  that  commend  themselves  ;  but  they,  measur- 
ing themselves  by  themselves,  and  comparing  themselves 

13  with  themselves,  are  not  wise.  But  we  will  not  glory  of 
things  beyond  our  measure,  but  according  to  the  measure 
of  the  line  which  God  hath  determined  for  us,  to  reach 

14  even  unto  you.  For  we  stretch  not  beyond  ourselves  as  if 
not  reaching  unto  you,  for  even  as    far  as  you  have  we 

15  come,  first,  with  the  Gospel  of  Christ.  Not  boasting  of 
things  beyond  our  measure,  in  other  men's  labors,  but 
having  a  hope,  when  your  faith  is  increased  among  you, 

16  to  be  enlarged  according  to  our  measure  beyond  you,  so 
as  to  preach  the  Gospel  beyond  your  limits,  and  not  to 

-boast  in  another  man's  line,  of  things  made  ready  for  us. 

17  But  he  that  glorieth,  let  him  glory  in  the  Lord.     For  not 

18  he  that  commendeth  himself  is  approved,  but  he  whom 
the  Lord  commends. 

XL  1.     Would  that  ye  would  bear  with  me  a  little  in  this 

2  foolishness ;  yea,  do  bear  with  me !  For  I  am  jealous 
over  you  with  a  godly  jealousy,  for  I  espoused  you  to 
one  husband,  to  present  you  as  a  chaste  virgin  to  Christ. 

3  But  I  fear,  lest  by  any  means,  as  the  serpent  beguiled 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  367 

Eve  through  his  subtilty,  that  so  your  minds  should  be 

4  corrupted  from  the  simplicity  that  is  in  Christ.  For  if 
he  who  Cometh  preacheth  another  Jesus  whom  we  have 
not  preached,  or  if  ye  receive  another  spirit  which  ye 
did  not  receive  from  us,  or  another  Gospel  which  ye 

5  have  not  obtained,  ye  might  well  bear  with  him.  But  I 
reckon  myself  in  nothing  behind  the  very  chief  of  the 

6  Apostles  :  for  though  I  am  rude  in  speech,  yet  not  so  in 
knowledge ;  but  altogether  have  we  been  made  manifest 

7  in  all  things  among  you.  Or  have  I  committed  an  of- 
fence in  humbling  myself  that  ye  might  be  exalted,  be- 
cause I  have  preached  to  you  the  Gospel  of  God  as  a 

8  free  gift.     I  spoiled  other  churches,  taking  their  pay  for 

9  your  services  ;  and  when  present  with  you  and  in  want, 
I  was  chargeable  to  no  one  :  for  the  brethren  who  came 
from  Macedonia  supplied  my  wants,  and  in  every  re- 
spect I  have  kept  myself  from  being  a  burden  to  you, 

10  and  will  so  keep  myself.  It  is  the  truth  of  Christ  in  me, 
that  this  boasting  of  mine  shall  not  be  stopped   in  the 

11  regions  of  Achaia.      Wherefore  ?     Because  I  love  you 

12  not  ?  God  knoweth.  But  I  do  this,  and  will  do  it,  that 
I  may  cut  away  occasion  from  them  who  desire  an  oc- 
casion,—  that  in  that  in  which  they  gloiy  they  may  be 

13  found  even  as  we.  For  such  are  false  Apostles,  deceit- 
ful workers,  transforming  themselves  into  the  Apostles  of 

14  Christ.    And  no  wonder,  for  Satan  himself  is  transformed 

15  into  an  angel  of  light.  Therefore  it  is  no  great  thing,  if 
his  ministers  also  are  transformed  as  ministers  of  right- 
eousness, —  whose  end  shall  be  according  to  their  works. 

16  —  I  say  again,  let  no  one  think  me  foolish  ;  but  even  if 
so,  then  even  as  a  fool  receive  me,  that  I  too  may  boast 

17  myself  a  little.  That  which  I  speak  in  this  confidence 
of  boasting,  I  speak  not  after  the  Lord,  but  as  it  were 

18  in  foolishness.     Since  many  glory  after  the  flesh,  I  will 


368  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

19  glory  also.     For,  wise  yourselves,  ye  endure  the  foolish 

20  sweetly.  For  ye  endure  it,  if  any  one  bring  you  into 
bondage,  if  any  one  make  a  prey  of  you,  if  any  one 
plunder  you,  if  any  one  exalt  himself,  if  any  one  smite 

21  you  on  the  face.  I  speak  with  reference  to  reproach,  as 
that  we  had  been  weak.     But  in  what  any  one  is  bold, 

22  in  foolishness  I  speak,  in  that  I  am  bold  also.  Are  they 
Hebrews  ?     So  am  I.     Are  they  Israelites  ?     So  am  I. 

23  Are  they  of  the  seed  of  Abraham  ?  So  am  I.  Are 
they  ministers  of  Christ?  I  am  more  so;  I  speak  as 
one  foolish :  in  labors  more  abundant ;  in  blows  beyond 

24  measure  :  in  prisons  more  frequent ;  in  deaths  oft.  From 
the  Jews  five  times  received  I  forty  stripes  save  one. 

25  Thrice  was  I  beaten  with  rods ;  once  was  I  stoned  ; 
thrice  I  suffered  shipwreck  ;  a  night  and  a  day  I  passed 

26  in  the  deep.  In  journeyings  often,  in  perils  of  rivers,  in 
perils  of  robbers,  in  perils  of  mine  own  people,  in  perils 
of  the  Heathen,  in  perils  in  cities,  in  perils  in  the  wilder- 
ness, in  perils  in  the  sea,  in  perils  among  false  brethren. 

27  In  weariness  and  painfulness,  in  watchings  often,  in  hun- 
ger and  thirst,  in  fastings  often,  in  cold  and  nakedness. 

28  Besides  these  outward  things,  there  is  that  pressure  upon 

29  me  daily,  —  the  care  of  all  the  Churches.  Who  is 
weak,  and  I  not  weak  >     Who  is  offended,  and  I  burn 

30  not  ?     If  I  must  boast,  I  will  boast   of  the  things  that 

31  concern  my  infirmities.  The  God  and  Father  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  He,  the  blessed  for  ever,  knoweth  that 

32  I  lie  not.  In  Damascus,  the  Ethnarch  of  Aretas  the 
King  guarded  the  city  of  the  Damascenes,   desirous  to 

33  apprehend  me.  And  through  a  window,  in  a  basket,  was 
I  let  down  by  the  wall,  and  escaped  his  hands. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  369 

If  we  peruse  this  Epistle,  as  we  always  ought  to 
do,  on  the  same  principle  on  which  we  should  read 
an  ordinary  Letter,  it  is  impossible  not  to  be  struck, 
not  only  with  the  abruptness  of  the  transition,  but 
with  the  whole  change  of  tone  and  manner,  from 
the  commencement  of  the  Tenth  Chapter.  From 
the  warm  language  of  undoubting  confidence  rec- 
ommending a  work  of  charity  and  Love,  in  which 
it  is  all  along  assumed  that  their  willing  hearts,  full 
of  Christian  sentiment,  would  require  little  urging 
from  colder  obligation  and  principle  to  move  them 
to  free  and  generous  action,  the  writer  passes,  on 
the  instant,  into  a  different  region  of  feeling ;  adopts 
the  guarded  manner  of  elaborate  self-defence,  of 
wounded  and  disappointed  affections,  vindicating 
their  claims;  and  a  style  at  times  so  severe,  that 
the  commentators,  in  a  somewhat  faulty  spirit  of 
criticism,  —  the  natural  man  in  them  exulting  in 
the  Apostle's  pungency,  —  call  our  attention  to  it 
as  the  perfection  of  bitter  irony.  Hence  it  has  been 
maintained  that  these  Chapters- cannot  form  the 
genuine  continuation  of  the  Epistle :  but  as  there 
is  no  doubt  that  they  are  St.  Paul's,  a  theory  has 
been  suggested  to  account  for  their  existence  in  their 
present  place.  It  is  highly  unnatural,  it  is  said, 
that  after  the  effusion  of  tenderness,  the  gush  of 
affection,  which  is  expressed  in  the  chapters  im- 
mediately preceding,  St.  Paul  should  so  abruptly 
resume  the  tone  of  reproach  and  self-assertion  in 
which  the  remainder  of  the  Epistle  is  written.  It 
is  supposed  to  be  more  probable,  that  this  latter 
portion  had  been  written  before  the  arrival  of  Titus 


370  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

from  Corinth.  After  that  arrival,  and  the  account 
it  brought  of  their  zeal,  penitence,  and  affection, 
St.  Paul,  it  is  argued,  felt  as  very  sensitive  people 
do,  when  having  complained  of  those  they  love 
they  find  that  the  affection  which  they  feared  was 
on  the  decline  is  as  warm  towards  them  as  ever. 
Paul  appears  to  be  at  a  loss  to  find  words  expres- 
sive enough  of  his  kindness  to  the  Corinthians. 
"  His  heart  is  enlarged,"  he  wishes  to  embrace  them 
all,  to  inclose  them  in  that  heart  which  had  ached 
a  short  time  before,  and  manifested  its  pain  and 
disappointment  in  words  of  expostulation.  How 
could  the  tone  of  complaint,  and  even  of  threaten- 
ing, be  thus  suddenly  resumed?  How  could  such 
an  affectionate  writer  allow  the  Epistle  to  end  so 
coldly,  and  with  such  self-reference,  as  it  does  at 
present?  Hence  it  is  conjectured,  that  from  Chap- 
ter Ten  to  the  close  had  been  in  preparation  when 
Titus  arrived  with  the  intelligence  that  the  Corin- 
thian Church,  notwithstanding  its  errors  and  credu- 
lity, was,  in  the  m?iin,  still  sound  in  heart  and  mind; 
—  that  then  Paul  laid  it  aside,  as  not  in  harmony 
with  the  revulsion  of  feeling  thus  produced,  —  but 
that  the  reverence  with  which  those  near  him  looked 
on  his  writings,  did  not  allow  them  to  destroy  this 
fragment ;  that  having  been  originally  intended  for 
the  Corinthians,  it  was  afterwards  inserted  at  the 
end  of  the  copies  of  the  Letter  which  was  actually 
sent,  as  an  Appendix ;  —  and  finally,  that  the  an- 
cient copyists,  not  being  very  exact  about  marks  of 
distinction  between  different  parts  of  a  composition, 
and  not  knowing  under  what  title  to  give  this  frag- 


IT.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  371 

ment,  united  it,  as  a  component  part,  with  the  Sec- 
ond Epistle  to  the  Corinthians. 

Ingenious  as  this  statement  unquestionably  is,  it 
is  pure  conjecture ;  nor  is  the  difficulty  so  great,  the 
order  of  thought  and  feeling  so  inexplicable,  as  to 
oblige  us  to  have  recourse  to  an  hypothesis  so  en- 
tirely arbitrary.  St.  Paul,  in  these  chapters,  is  in 
fact  addressing  himself  to  persons  totally  different 
from  those  with  whom  his  tones  of  expostulation 
had  melted  into  tenderness,  and  his  wounded  sym- 
pathies into  the  overflowing  warmth  of  recovered 
confidence.  It  is  certainly  in  the  moment  when  the 
heart  has  regained  a  friend,  —  warmed  anew  into 
the  confidingness  of  a  love  over  which  some  chill  of 
distrust  had  passed,  —  that  we  are  least  capable  of 
measured  restraint  in  the  expression  of  the  affections, 
and  totally  incapable  of  barbing  our  words  with 
severe  and  lacerating  truth.  But  there  is  a  third 
Party  concerned  in  these  Epistles,  remaining  in  hos- 
tile relation  to  St.  Paul,  —  professing  neither  affec- 
tion for  his  Person,  nor  respect  for  his  Authority,  — 
a  faction  of  rival  Teachers,  not  raw  converts  thought- 
lessly misled,  but  artful  and  designing  misleaders,  — 
and  a  residue  of  the  Church,  to  whom  the  mixture 
of  dross  and  clay  with  which  these  Teachers  adul- 
terated the  Gospel,  proved  more  acceptable  than  the 
pure  and  uncompromising  form,  of  Spiritual  Chris- 
tianity. It  is  to  these  two  parties,  the  false  Apos- 
tles, as  they  are  here  called,  and  their  abettors,  who 
with  the  spiritual  nature  of  Christianity  wished  to 
conjoin  the  carnal  dependence  of  Judaism,  its  spirit 
of  reliance    on    outward    qualifications,  that   these 


372  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

chapters  are  addressed.  We  might,  for  the  purpose 
of  iliustration,  conceive  of  a  disaffected  Province,  in 
which  simple  and  unlettered  men,  with  vague  and 
crude  notions  of  the  fundamental  principles  of  So- 
ciety, and  of  their  own  Duties  and  Rights  as  mem- 
bers of  a  Community,  —  exposed  on  all  sides  to  the 
tempting  Logic  of  convenience,  had  been  led  to  the 
very  brink  of  the  practical  assertion  of  false  theories, 
destructive  of  the  very  existence  of  Civilization. 
Now  such  a  Community,  even  when  trembling  on 
the  verge  of  such  evil,  it  is  possible  that  a  paternal 
Government  by  the  exhibition  of  a  generous  sym- 
pathy with  the  sources  of  temptation,  by  the  ready 
removal  of  all  known  causes  of  just  offence,  by  in- 
struction and  persuasion,  by  salutary  measures  of 
conciliation  and  prevention,  might  win  over,  out  of 
all  the  elements  of  disorder,  to  a  sound  mind,  an 
enlightened  conscience,  and  a  well-affected  heart,  — 
and  yet  totally  fail  of  producing  any  such  impression 
on  the  leaders  and  instigators  of  the  movement, — 
on  men  not  honestly  misled  by  false  Doctrines,  but 
cunningly  pursuing  selfish  purposes,  working  their 
own  ends  out  of  popular  ignorance,  credulity,  and 
ruin.  The  utmost  mildness  might  be  due  to  one  of 
these  parties,  and  the  utmost  severity  to  the  other,  — 
and  if  we  supposed  the  rightful  and  legitimate  Au- 
thority to  issue  an  address  of  Remonstrance  and 
Persuasion,  to  the  tempted  and  the  misled,  it  might 
most  properly  speak  only  of  forbearance,  forgiveness, 
and  even  strong  confidence  in  their  healthier  and 
better  mind, — whilst  to  the  tempters  and  prime 
movers,  baffled,  but  not  penitent,  it  spoke  only  of  the 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  373 

vindication  of  its  outraged  Law,  and  in  the  threat- 
enings  of  its  Power.  The  Ecclesiastical  condition 
we  are  considering  was  exactly  parallel  to  this  state 
of  things.  St.  Paul  was  the  rightful  Authority,  the 
legitimate  Apostle  ;  —  there  was  a  disaffected  Church 
which  he  had  won  over  by  his  meekness,  earnest- 
ness, and  love,  to  the  simplicity  that  is  in  Christ ;  and 
there  was  a  residue  of  factions  and  interested  parti- 
sans, upon  whom  these  mild  measures  produced  no 
effect,  and  to  whose  evil  and  unthwarted  influences 
the  Church  could  not  be  left  exposed.  There  is  a 
limit  to  the  degree  in  which  the  evilly  disposed  ought 
to  be  treated  with  forbearing  gentleness,  and  that 
limit  arises  out  of  the  necessity  of  protecting  the 
peace  and  virtue  which  they  have  the  power  to  cor- 
rupt and  disturb.  It  was  a  party  of  this  description, 
whatever  may  have  been  their  number,  of  which  we 
are  not  informed,  who  kept  alive  the  flames  of  relig- 
ious animosity  and  personal  pretensions.  They  pro- 
fessed to  teach  a  more  legitimate  Gospel,  which  was 
in  fact  a  compound  of  Christianity,  Judaism,  and 
speculative  Philosophy,  —  and  to  be  in  their  own 
Persons  clothed  with  an  Apostolic  Authority  more 
genuine  than  St.  Paul's.  The  peace  of  the  Church, 
the  claim  upon  him  of  those  who  adhered  to  his  per- 
son and  authority,  required  that  these  pretensions 
should  be  discomfited  and  their  evil  source  exposed. 
It  is  therefore  after  lavishing  the  persuasive  resources 
of  his  Christian  mind  and  spirit  upon  those  who 
were  open  to  conviction,  that  he  closes  with  this  ad- 
dress to  those  whose  element  was  strife,  and  warns 
them  that  their  Power  for  evil  must  be  destroyed. 

32 


374  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Against  the  Charch  he  would  direct  no  severity;  he 
would  employ  only  the  meekness  and  gentleness  of 
Christ ;  he  would  not  even  come  to  them  whilst  the 
shadow  of  misunderstanding  lay  between  them;  — 
but  when  Love  and  admonition  had  done  all  that 
moral  instruments  can  effect,  —  then  must  it  be 
shown  that  his  forbearance  had  not  its  source  in 
weakness ;  and  the  incorrigible,  whom  Persuasion 
could  not  render  penitent,  a  just  Authority  must  ren- 
der powerless.  This  is  the  mingled  sentiment  of  the 
sixth  verse,  the  desire  to  reserve  all  exercise  of  Power 
until  Moral  influences  had  gained  over  all  those  with 
whom  there  was  any  chance  of  their  being  effectual : 
"  We  shall  be  ready  to  avenge  all  disobedience,  when 
your  obedience  shall  be  complete."  What  was  the 
nature  of  the  Power  to  be  employed,  and  of  the 
Punishment  threatened,  is  open  to  conjecture,  and 
the  subject  is  usually  dismissed  by  saying,  that  the 
supernatural  energy  of  the  Apostle  would  be  called 
in  to  make  clear  his  own  superiority,  and  punish  the 
offenders.  But  these  are  the  methods  of  triumph 
which  the  passionate  and  unspiritual  mind  is  always 
eager  to  see  adopted ;  and  it  would  be  as  impossi- 
ble to  prove  that  they  were  ever  contemplated  by 
St.  Paul,  as  that  this  would  be  a  justifiable  employ- 
ment of  such  gifts,  or  at  all  suitable  to  the  exigency 
of  the  case.  St.  Paul  himself  speaks  of  very  differ- 
ent instruments  as  the  weapons  of  his  warfare ;  but 
Miracles  are  the  ready  means  by  which  those,  whose 
dependence  is  on  an  external  and  sensible  Revela- 
tion, are  impatient  to  have  every  difficulty  cut.  Yet 
'Christ's   treatment   of  the   Pharisees,  that  piercing 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  375 


flash  of  indignant  Truth  into  the  most  secret  bosom 
of  craft  and  pretension,  that  terrible  self-revealing  to 
which  no  answer  was  possible  or  was  attempted, 
might  have  been  enough  to  show,  without  Miracle, 
the  natural  ascendency  of  such  spirits,  and  the 
power  of  unsparing  exposure,  whenever  it  chooses 
to  exert  it,  which  Truth  has  over  Falsehood,  Light 
over  Darkness,  Good  over  Evil.  To  that  perfect 
Being  who  exhibited  every  phase  of  Power,  this 
prerogative  of  Light  and  Purity  of  soul  could  never 
be  his  loved  or  favorite  exercise ;  but  still,  that  the 
representation  of  spiritual  energy  might  be  complete, 
we  have  that  one  example  of  the  meekest  of  beings, 
by  the  force  of  Truth,  withering  selfishness  and  false- 
hood, as  by  fire  from  Heaven.  In  the  conflict  with 
Darkness  and  Evil,  Light  and  Goodness  require  no 
weapons,  but  those  which  their  own  essence  sup- 
plies, and  for  him  who  can  utter  the  "  "Word  of  God," 
"  it  is  quick  and  powerful,  sharper  than  any  two- 
edged  sword,  piercing  even  to  the  dividing  asunder 
of  flesh  and  spirit,  a  discerner  of  the  intents  and 
thoughts  of  the  heart."  Accordingly,  in  the  passage 
before  us,  speaking  of  the  instruments  to  be  directed 
against  the  devices  of  the  enemies  of  the  pure  Gos- 
pel, St.  Paul  says,  with  no  apprehension  of  their  in- 
sufficiency, "  The  weapons  of  our  warfare  are  not  car- 
nal, but  mighty,  through  God,  to  the  pulling  down  of 
strongholds,  —  overturning  imaginations  and  every 
high  thing  that  exalteth  itself  against  the  knowledge 
of  God,  —  and  bringing  into  captivity  every  thought 
to  the  obedience  of  Christ."  We  can  readily  con- 
ceive, without  having  recourse  to  Miracle,  what  over- 


376  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

whelming  exposure  an  Apostolic  Mind  could  make 
of  the  false,  selfish,  and  carnal  spirit  cloaked  in  Re- 
ligion. And  such  a  mind,  we  religiously  believe,  is 
ripening  for  our  own  day,  and  will  have  its  Mission 
from  God,  and  its  Prophet-tongue  unloosed,  when 
the  fulness  of  time  is  come. 

We  have  in  these  chapters  strange  glimpses 
opened  to  us  of  the  kind  of  difficulties  and  embar- 
rassments which  a  Preacher  of  pure  Spirituality  in 
Religion,  of  the  simplicity  that  is  in  Christ,  encoun- 
tered in  those  days  ;  and  if  they  do  not  well  accord 
with  that  traditional  halo  with  which  we  have  sur- 
rounded the  person  and  authority  of  an  Apostle, 
they  may  bring  us  nearer  to  the  reality  of  things,  and 
show  us  the  patient  and  struggling  means,  in  the 
midst  of  low  and  discomfiting  circumstances,  by 
which,  in  every  age.  Truth  and  Principle  must  be 
contented,  slowly,  and  as  they  can,  to  advance  their 
standard.  We  are  apt  to  imagine  an  Apostle  as 
one,  before  whose  heavenly  and  inspired  Eloquence, 
Doubt  and  Obduracy  vanished  ;  and  in  the  presence 
of  whose  sainted  Authority,  every  resisting  tendency 
was  reverently  silent.  Nothing  could  be  farther  from 
the  truth  than  this  unexamined  remnant  of  our  child- 
ish thought,  and  that^  not  from  any  deficiency  of 
Power  or  Holiness  in  the  first  Preachers  of  the  Gos- 
pel, but  because  Evil  and  Error  are  real  and  stubborn 
Forces,  and  yield  not  without  a  conflict.  We  shall  at- 
tempt to  make  distinct,  from  the  slight  traces  here  re- 
corded, the  nature  and  spirit  of  that  opposition,  which 
obliged  St.  Paul  to  have  recourse  to  two  expedients, 
which,  except  with  reference  to  the  exposure  of  such 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,    XI.  377 

evils,  he  tells  us,  the  spirit  of  Christianity  did  not  per- 
mit,—  to  threaten,  and  to  boast,  —  to  vindicate  his 
own  claims  as  an  Apostle  on  the  love  and  submission 
of  the  Church,  against  those  who  denied  them. 

1.  There  was  something,  we  know  not  what,  in 
the  person  and  demeanor  of  Paul,  which  his  enemies 
at  Corinth  did  not  scruple  to  place  in  humiliating 
contrast  with  the  loftiness  and  energy  of  his  intellect- 
ual character.  This  indeed  is  the  lowest  weapon  of 
vulgar  minds  :  but  such  was  the  fact,  —  and  we  must 
remember  that  this  was  facilitated  by  the  natural  ten- 
dencies of  the  Greek  Mind,  which  made  a  Worship 
of  the  Beautiful ;  and  whose  highest  accomplish- 
ment, in  their  social  relations,  was  a  faultless  Elo- 
quence. It  would  appear  that  these  personal  char- 
acteristics, whatever  they  were,  threw  a  certain  air  of 
feebleness  over  his  actual  presence  and  address,  so 
that  it  was  not  difficult  to  contrast,  mockingly,  the 
fire  and  energy  of  the  Writer,  with  the  weakness 
and  unimposingness  of  the  Speaker.  If  this  was  so, 
we  shall  never  be  able  to  rectify  our  associations  in 
this  matter  :  nor  is  a  severe  reduction  of  our  impres- 
sions to  historic  reality  on  such  a  point  worth  the 
labor  it  would  cost ;  for  who  could  readily  mould  his 
mind  to  the  habitual  remembrance  that  Paul  at 
Athens,  that  Paul  before  Agrippa,  that  Paul  before 
the  Council  of  his  Nation,  was  feeble  and  ineffec- 
tive in  form  and  utterance.  Such,  however,  is  the  re- 
lation of  physical  Powers  to  the  effect  of  Oratory, 
that  this  is  possible ;  and  if  we  sought  a  case  in  point, 
we  might  remember  that  Burke,  who  possessed  a 
mind  the  richest  in  the  gifts  of  Eloquence  that  the 

32* 


378         SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

world  has  ever  seen,  and  who,  moreover,  had  most  of 
the  external  advantages  that  aid  these  powers,  through 
some  infelicity  of  Delivery,  rarely  could  command  the 
attention  of  an  Audience,  for  the  very  Speeches  that 
every  one  was  eager  to  read.  It  may  be  true,  there- 
fore, which  indeed  could  hardly  be  affirmed  unless  it 
was  true,  and  which  Paul  does  not  concern  himself 
to  deny,  "  that  though  his  Epistles  were  weighty  and 
powerful,  his  bodily  presence  was  weak,  and  his 
speech  contemptible."  The  use  that  was  made  of 
this  circumstance,  was  an  attempt  to  reduce  the 
boldness  of  his  writing  to  the  insignificance  of  his 
personal  address,  to  represent  it  as  mere  boasting, 
—  distant  thunder,  which  when  it  came  near  would 
sink  into  a  murmur.  This,  which  gives  its  point 
to  the  first  verse,  is  obscured  by  the  word  "  base," 
which  does  not  convey  the  proper  image :  "  Now 
I,  Paul,  who  when  present  among  you,  am  of  poor 
and  mean  appearance,  but  when  absent  am  bold 
towards  you,  beseech  you  not  to  cause  it  to  come  to 
pass,  that  when  present  I  should  be  bold  towards  you 
with  that  confidence,  with  which  I  must  be  bold 
against  those  who  represent  me  as  actuated  by  a 
worldly  and  carnal  spirit,  walking  according  to  the 
flesh."  There  is  a  tradition  in  the  Church  respecting 
the  personal  appearance  of  St.  Paul  in  conformity 
with  these  notices,  mentioned  by  Chrysostom,  and 
I  believe  even  by  earlier  writers ;  but  it  would  be 
impossible  to  determine  whether  this  was  history,  or 
merely  of  the  nature  of  a  myth,  framed  into  corres- 
pondence with  the  supposed  sense  of  these  passages. 
2.  It  was  objected  to  St.  Paul,  that,  as  he  had  no 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.  X.,    XI.  .379 

personal  intercourse  with  Christ,  he  could  not  pos- 
sess the  requisite  qualifications  of  an  Apostle,  and 
that  his  Authority  was  not  legitimately  derived,  but 
rested  on  grounds  of  his  own  stating.  To  this  he 
replies  by  an  appeal  to  the  signs  of  his  Apostleship, 
which  were  afforded  by  the  successful  labors  of  his 
Preaching  and  his  Life.  The  actual  conversion  of 
a  large  part  of  the  Heathen  world  to  Christianity 
through  his  means,  was  a  claim  to  be  recognized  as 
a  Minister  of  Christ,  which  they  who  used  the  objec- 
tion could  not  advance  upon  their  own  behalf.  They 
had  done  nothing  but  commend  tliernselves,  —  they 
had  come  to  the  scene  of  another  man's  labors,  and 
on  the  very  field  which  he  had  won  from  Idolatry 
and  fertilized  with  living  waters,  sought  to  calumni- 
ate his  name.  I  shall  give  the  spirit  of  the  argument 
from  the  seventh  verse  to  the  end  of  the  chapter, 
which  is  scarcely  intelligible  in  our  Translation : 
"  Consider  that  which  lies  before  your  eyes,  —  that 
which  I  have  done  in  your  Church,  which  owes  to  me 
even  its  origin.  If  we  are  bold  in  word,  we  are  also 
earnest  in  work;  for  we  are  not  of  those  who  are 
content  with  a  simple  commendation  of  themselves, 
having  no  deeds  to  praise  them  ;  for  they,  taking  an 
inward  measurement  of  themselves,  not  according 
to  their  outward  performances,  but  according  to  their 
self-appreciation,  are  not  wise ;  but  ive  will  not  boast 
beyond  the  measure  of  what  we  have  done,  but  only 
within  that  sphere  of  action  which  God  has  assigned 
to  us,  and  which  has  brought  the  Gospel  even  unto 
you  ;  —  nor  in  reaching  you  have  we  overstepped  the 
lands  that  lay  along  the  line  of  our  Apostolic  prog- 


380  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

ress,  but  have  to  come  to  you  in  the  regular  succes- 
sion of  our  course,  and  we  have  hope  that  you  will 
not  detain  us  longer  on  our  way,  —  that  when  your 
faith  is  strengthened  you  will  suffer  us  to  pass  on,  in 
our  glorious  Mission  to  the  regions  that  lie  beyond 
you ;  for  as  our  works  and  not  ourselves  must  praise 
us,  we  have  not  entered  into  other  men's  labors,  nor, 
like  you  false  Apostles,  sought  glory  in  another's 
sphere,  from  things  which  his  toil  had  made  ready  to 
their  hands.  But  let  him  who  would  glory,  glory  in 
his  Lord's  work  done,  —  for  it  is  not  he  who  com- 
mendeth  himself  that  is  approved,  but  he  whom  his 
Master  commendeth." 

3.  What  might  least  be  expected,  it  was  imputed 
to  some  consciousness  of  an  usurped  office  that  he 
preached  the  Gospel  of  God  freely,  and  refused  to 
derive  from  it  the  support  for  which  he  was  depend- 
ent on  the  liberality  of  other  Churches  ;  "  Have  I 
committed  an  offence  in  humbling  myself  that  ye 
might  be  exalted,  because  I  have  preached  to  you 
the  Gospel  of  God  without  cost  ?  I  spoiled  other 
Churches,  taking  wages  from  them  that  I  might  min- 
ister to  you ;  and,  when  I  was  present  with  you  and 
w^anted,  I  was  chargeable  to  no  man,  for  the  breth- 
ren who  came  from  Macedonia  supplied  my  want, 
and  in  every  respect  I  have  kept  myself  from  being 
burdensome  unto  you,  and  so  will  keep  myself." 
This  peculiar  course  St.  Paul  may  originally  have 
been  led  to  adopt  in  relation  to  Corinth  from  the 
noted  woiidliness  and  venality  of  that  city,  and  from 
the  crowd  of  Sophists  and  Rhetoricians  who,  under 
the  name  of  public  Teachers,  had  become  a  proverb 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    X.,   XI.  381 

of  pretension  and  corruption ;  and  it  would  appear, 
from  the  twelfth  verse  of  the  eleventh  chapter,  that 
he  thought  his  example  in  this  matter  necessary  to 
shame  and  restrain  the  charge  of  an  inordinate  thirst 
of  gain,  from  those  whom  he  calls  the  false  Apostles  : 
"  What  I  have  done,  that  I  will  continue  to  do,  that 
I  may  cut  off  occasion  from  those  who  seek  occasion, 
—  that  in  that  wherein  they  boast,  they  may  be 
found  even  as  we." 

Against  such  opposition,  amidst  such  low  conten- 
tion, had  St.  Paul  to  maintain  his  way ;  and  it  be- 
longs to  the  inherent  greatness  of  his  character,  that 
though  we  read  these  things,  no  association  with 
them  attaches  to  his  image  in  our  thoughts.  The 
circumstances,  however  mean  and  limiting,  which 
magnanimity  conquers,  fall  away  from  around  the 
noble  spirit,  and  show  it  only  in  the  meekness  and 
loftiness  of  its  Power.  No  life  can  be  low  where 
great  ends  are  followed  ;  and  the  spirit  that  will  not 
work  its  Mission  within  the  trammel  of  Circumstance 
will  never  be  a  true  servant  of  that  Master  who  came 
to  found  a  Kingdom  of  Heaven  upon  Earth,  and  who 
had  to  associate  with  him  in  the  work  men  of  anoth- 
er spirit  than  his  own,  and  even  the  traitor  who  sold 
away  his  life. 

It  is  evident  that  the  self-commendations  of  these 
men  must  have  had  their  effect,  else  would  St.  Paul 
never  have  exposed  the  counterfeit  by  bringing  his 
own  merits  into  contrast ;  —  but  as  there  might  be 
a  time  when  a  patriot  would  have  to  speak  of  what 
he  had  done  without  reward,  in  order  to  shame  some 
official  plunderer  on  pretence  of  service,    so  if  the 


382  SECOND    EPISTLE     TO     THE    CORINTHIANS. 

Corinthians,  as  is  stated  in  the  twentieth  verse,  "  bore 
it  patiently  when  such  men  brought  them  into  bond- 
age, made  a  prey  of  them,  took  their  goods,  lorded 
it  over  them,"  it  was  full  time  to  hear  the  boasting 
of  one  who  had  truly  served  them,  and  sought  noth- 
ing in  return.  Such  boasting,  indeed,  Paul  repeat- 
edly says,  is  in  itself  utterly  foolish ;  but  it  might  do 
good,  if  it  exposed  those  who  boasted  without  a 
cause.  How  tender  is  the  reproach  addressed  to  the 
Church  whom  St.  Paul  won  to  the  Truth,  and  whom 
such  men  for  a  moment  could  deceive !  "  I  am  jeal- 
ous over  you,  with  a  zeal  for  God,  for  I  have  es- 
poused you  to  one  husband,  and  thought  to  present 
you  as  a  chaste  Virgin  to  Christ.  But  I  fear  lest  as 
the  serpent  beguiled  Eve,  that  your  minds  may  be 
corrupted  from  the  simplicity  that  is  in  Christ.  If, 
indeed,  they  that  intruded  themselves  among  you 
preached  another  Jesus  whom  I  had  not  preached, 
or  enriched  you  with  a  spirit  and  a  Gospel  which 
you  had  not  received  from  us,  then  might  you  have 
reason  to  have  given  them  the  hearts  that  were  ours, 
—  but  we  are  in  no  respect  inferior  to  the  chief  of 
the  Apostles,  and  this  has  been  made  thoroughly 
manifest  among  you  all." 

And  then,  he  recounts  his  sufferings,  indignities, 
and  humiliations  as  the  world  and  his  enemies 
would  think,  but  the  true  honors  of  him  who  glo- 
ried in  some  share  of  his  Master's  Cross,  and  thanked 
God  that  he  was  found  worthy  to  suffer  shame  for 
his  name.  We  know  nothing  finer  in  sentiment,  or 
eloquence,  than  that  passage,  —  "If  I  must  boast,  I 
will  boast  of  my  infirmities."     To  boast  of  degrad- 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.   X.,   XI.  383    - 

ing  sufferings,  of  stonings,  stripes,  and  bonds,  of 
fastings,  cold,  and  nakedness,  —  this  was  a  glory  in 
which  his  traducers  would  not  seek  to  rival  him. 
To  suffer,  that  others  may  rejoice,  —  to  be  poor,  that 
others  may  be  truly  rich,  —  to  watch  and  guard,  and 
open  our  own  bosoms  to  the  world,  that  others  may 
have  peace  and  blessing  and  the  life  of  Life,  —  this 
is  the  captivity  which  Christ  leads  captive,  the  servi- 
tude which  God  exalts  into  that  Greatness  which 
belongs  to  those  whom  He  has  anointed  with  His 
own  Spirit. 


384  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 


SECTION    II. 

ST.  Paul's    qualifications    not    from    himself,  but  of 

god's  grace.  — HIS  visions  and  revelations. THE  AC- 
COMPANIMENT OF  THE  CHASTENING    THORN    IN  THE  FLESH. 

HIS    CLAIMS    UPON    THE    LOVE    AND    OBEDIENCE    OF    THE 

CORINTHIAN  CHURCH. HIS  PRAYER  THAT  THEIR  RESTO- 
RATION TO  A  CHRISTIAN  MIND  MAY  REDUCE  THEIR  APOS- 
TLE   TO    THE    LEVEL    OF    THEIR  BROTHER. EXHORTATION 

AND   BENEDICTION. 


CHAPS.   XII.,   XIII. 


XII.  1.     Boasting,  indeed,  is  not  expedient  for  me  :  I  will 

2  come  then  to  visions  and  revelations  of  the  Lord.  I 
knew  a  man  in  Christ,  fourteen  years  ago,  —  whether  in 
the  body,  I  know  not ;  or  out  of  the  body,  I  know  not ; 
God  knows,  —  who  was  caught  up  to  the  third  heaven. 

3  And  I  knew  such  a  man,  —  whether  in  the  body,  or  out 

4  of  the  body,  I  know  not ;  God  knows,  —  how  that  he  was 
caught  up  into  paradise,  and  heard  unspeakable  words 

5  which  it  is  not  permitted  to  any  man  to  utter.  For  such 
an  one  will  I  glory  :  but  for  myself  I  will  n«t  glory,  un- 

6  less  of  mine  infirmities.  For  though  I  should  desire  to 
gloiy,  I  shall  not  be  a  fool,  for  I  will  speak  the  truth  ; 
but  1  forbear,  lest  any  one  should  account  me  above  that 
which  he  sees  me,  or  what  he  heareth  of  me. 

7  And  that  I  should  not  be  too  much  exalted  through  the 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  385 

abundance  of  these  revelations,  there  was  given  to  me  a 
thorn  in  the  flesh,  an  angel  of  Satan  to  buffet  me,  that  I 

8  should  not  be  too  much  exalted.  For  this  thing  I  be- 
sought the    Lord  thrice,  that  it  might  depart  from  me. 

9  And  he  said  unto  me,  "  My  grace  is  sufficient  for  thee : 
for  my  strength  is  made  perfect  in  weakness."  Most 
gladly,  therefore,  will  I  rather  boast  in  my  infirmities, 

10  that  the  power  of  Christ  may  tabernacle  with  me.  Where- 
fore I  am  well  pleased  in  infirmities,  in  reproaches,  in 
necessities,  in  persecutions,   in  straits  for  Christ's  sake ; 

11  for  when  I  am  weak,  then  am  I  strong.  I  have  become 
a  fool :  ye  have  forced  me  to  it ;  for  I  ought  to  have  been 
commended  by  you,  for  I  am  nothing  behind  the  chief  of 

12  the  Apostles,  though  I  am  nothing.  Verily  the  signs  of 
an  Apostle  have  been  wrought  among  you  in  all  persever- 

13  ance,  in  signs,  and  wonders,  and  mighty  deeds.  For 
what  is  there  wherein  ye  were  inferior  to  the  other 
Churches,  unless  it  be  that  I  myself  was  not  burdensome 

14  to  you  ?  Forgive  me  this  wrong.  And  now  I  hold  my- 
self in  readiness  for  this  third  time  to  come  unto  you, 
and  I  will  not  be  burdensome  to  you  ;  for  I  seek  not  yours, 
but  you ;  for  the  children  ought  not  to  lay  up  for  the  pa- 

15  rents,  but  the  parents  for  the  children.  But  I  will  very 
gladly  spend,   and  be  spent,  for  your  souls,  even  though 

16  the  more  abundantly  I  love  you,  the  less  I  be  loved.  But 
be  it  so,  I  did  not  burden  you  ;  nevertheless,  being  crafty, 

17  I  caught  you  with  guile  ?     Did  I  make  a  gain  of  you,  by 

18  any  of  those  whom  I  sent  unto  you  ?  I  desired  Titus,  and 
with  him  I  sent  a  brother.  Did  Titus  make  a  gain  of 
you  ?     Walked  we  not  in  the  same  spirit  ?     Walked  we 

19  not  in  the  same  steps  ?  Again,  think  ye  that  we  excuse 
ourselves  unto  you  ?  Before  the  face  of  God,  in  Christ 
we  speak  all  these  things,  beloved,  for  your  edification. 

20  For  I  fear  lest  when  I  come  I  may  not  find  you  such  as  I 

33 


386  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

would,  and  that  I  may  be  found  by  you  such  as  ye  would 
not :  lest  there  be  strifes,  envyings,  wraths,  cabals,  back- 
21  bitings,  whisperings,  swellings,  tumults.  Lest  when  I  come 
again  my  God  may  humble  me  among  you,  and  I  shall 
mourn  for  many  of  those  who  have  sinned  before,  and 
have  not  repented  of  the  uncleanness,  and  fornication,  and 
lasciviousness,  which  they  have  committed. 

XIII.  1.  This  is  the  third  time  I  am  coming  to  you  :  by  the 
mouth  of  two  or  three  witnesses  shall  every  word  be  es- 

2  tablished.  I  told  you  before,  and  forewarn  this  second 
time,  as  if  I  was  present,  though  I  am  absent,  those  who 
have  heretofore  sinned,  and  all  others,  that  if  I  so  come 

3  again,  I  will  not  spare  :  since  ye  seek  a  proof  of  Christ 
speaking  in   me,  who  towards  you   is  not  weak,  but  is 

4  mighty  among  you.  For  though  he  was  crucified  in 
weakness,  he  yet  liveth  by  the  power  of  God.  And  we 
also  are  weak  in  him,  yet  shall  we  live  with  him  towards 

5  you,  by  the  power  of  God.  Try  yourselves  whether  ye 
be  in  the  faith :  prove  your  own  selves.  Or,  know  ye 
not  of  yourselves  whether  Jesus  Christ   is  in  you  ?     If 

6  not,  ye  are  without  proof.     But  I  trust  ye  shall  know  that 

7  we  are  not  unproved.  Now  I  pray  to  God  that  ye  do  no 
evil ;  not  that  we  may  appear  approved,  but  that  ye 
should  do  that  which  is  right,  though  we  may  be  unproved. 

8  For  we   can  do  nothing  against  the  truth ;    but  for  the 

9  truth.     For  we  are  glad  when  we  are  weak,  and  ye  are 

10  strong,  —  and  even  this  we  wish,  your  restoration.  Where- 
fore I  write  these  things,  when  absent,  that  when  present 
I  may  not  act  severely,  according  to  the  power  which  the 
Lord  hath  given  me  for  edification,  not  for  destruction. 

11  Finally,  brethren,  farewell.  Be  reconciled  ;  be  of  good 
comfort ;  be   of  one   mind ;  live  in  peace ;  and  the  God 

12  of  love  and  peace  shall  be  with  you.     Greet  one  another 

13  with  an  holy  kiss.     All  the  saints  salute  you. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  387 

14      The  grace  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  the  love  of 
God,  and  the  fellowship  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  be  with  you  all ! 


True  greatness  and  simplicity  of  mind,  are  in 
nothing  more  apparent  than  in  their  occasional  vio- 
lations of  the  conventional  Moralities  of  life.  They 
know  when  to  overstep  that  network  of  artificial 
manners  and  restraints,  by  which  the  lower  minds 
sometimes  attempt  to  place  them  in  a  false  position. 
And  this  they  do  by  having  the  courage  to  be  true, 
—  by  showing  outwardly  what  they  are  feeling  in- 
wardly,—  by  having  the  sincerity  to  speak  what 
every  body  knows  must  be  passing  in  their  thoughts. 
Self-commendation  is  one  of  the  gravest  offences 
against  conventional  Morals.  It  belongs  to  the  class 
of  odious  Manners^  of  which  Society  is  often  more 
intolerant  than  it  is  of  absolute  Vices.  This  is  one 
of  the  cases  in  which  evil  suppresses  evil,  not  by 
eradicating,  but  by  forcing  it  into  concealment.  It 
is  for  the  most  part  our  own  Self-Esteem,  that  makes 
us  so  determined  to  suppress  the  exhibitions  of  it  in 
others ;  for  to  none  is  it  so  little  offensive,  as  to  those 
men  of  large  Nature,  of  calm  and  self-relying  hearts, 
who  are  completely  free  from  it  themselves.  There 
is  an  irritation  excited  by  the  display  of  Self-Esteem, 
which  too  plainly  shows  that  our  Vanity  is  encroach- 
ed upon  by  the  Vanity  of  another ;  and  that  the 
universal  suppression  of  this  folly  in  good  Society  is 
rather  a  compact  of  decorum,  an  agreement  to  avoid 
mutual  offence,  than  any  proof  of  a  prevailing  hu- 
mility or  self-forgetfulness.     And  the  minds  that  are 


388  SECOx\D    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

most  consumed  by  Self-Love,  are  those  which  adopt 
the  most  self-depreciating  language,  for  they  well 
know  that  this  is  the  only  means  to  extort  the  flat- 
tery of  Society.  Society,  which  resents  Self-com- 
mendation, is,  in  fact,  propitiated  by  the  opposite  ex- 
hibition of  Self-depreciation ;  and  so  there  is  often 
an  ostentatious  sacrifice  of  Self-praise,  as  the  means 
of  evoking  that  other  Praise  which  is  infinitely  sweet- 
er. It  has  often  been  observed,  that  nothing  is  more 
dangerous  than  to  take  at  their  word  those  who  are 
in  the  habit  of  depreciating  themselves ;  —  the  Mask 
is  instantly  taken  off,  the  tone  altered,  and  the  object 
of  the  feigned  humility  exposed.  Every  one  knows, 
indeed,  that  some  expression  of  self-disparagement 
is  the  common  trick  by  which  to  direct  attention  to 
one's  self,  and  draw  forth  the  very  dregs  of  commen-  - 
dation  from  the  most  reluctant  lips;  —  but  there  are 
certain  refined  modes  of  laying  this  snare,  which  by 
deceiving  the  common  observer  are  eminently  suc- 
cessful, —  and  even  self-deceive  the  wily  heart  that 
practises  them.  The  vainer  minds  turn  to  account 
the  conventional  rule  which  prohibits  the  display  of 
Self- Esteem,  by  such  large  sacrifices  to  the  letter  of 
this  Propriety,  by  such  open  exhibitions  of  the  oppo- 
site extreme,  that  notwithstanding  their  violations  of 
its  spirit.  Society  is  flattered  by  the  seeming  conces- 
sion and  takes  up  their  praise  ;  whilst  the  truly  mod- 
est minds,  elevated  far  above  Self- Esteem  by  the 
very  nature  of  their  pursuits,  by  the  character  of 
their  desires,  unconsciously  observe  these  convention- 
al Laws,  yet  can  on  occasion  set  them  aside  with  a 
manly  simplicity,  whenever  any  interest  higher  than 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  389 

Self-Love  requires  that  the  Truth  should  be  spoken, 
even  though  it  must  assume  the  painful  form  of 
Self- Commendation.  It  may  happen  as  it  did  at 
Corinth,  that  Truths,  Facts,  Influences,  of  the  last 
importance  in  their  moral  action  on  mankind,  may 
be  staked  on  the  personal  reputation  of  an  Individ- 
ual, and  may  be  obscured  and  discredited  by  the 
successful  machinations  of  an  Impostor.  Would 
St.  Paul  have  been  deserving  of  praise  for  his  hu- 
mility, and  not  rather  of  the  gravest  condemnation 
for  sacrificing  the  perilled  interests  of  Christianity 
to  a  conventional  propriety,  if  through  the  small 
fear  of  speaking  the  Truth  about  himself,  of  being 
charged  with  self-glory,  he  had  abandoned  the  Cor- 
inthians, and  the  cause  of  the  free  Gospel  at  Corinth, 
to  the  unworthy  arts  of  those  who  traduced  his  char- 
acter that  they  might  preach  another  Gospel?  As 
he  had  nothing  of  that  false  humility  which  seeks 
praise  by  Self-depreciation,  he  had  nothing  of  that 
slavish  subjection  to  social  fear  which  would  forbid 
him  to  speak  the  Truth  respecting  himself,  when  the 
influence  of  evil  men  was  to  be  restrained.  And  it 
is  the  privilege  of  Simplicity,  of  Singleness  of  mind, 
should  occasion  arise,  to  speak  of  itself  without  of- 
fence, —  of  its  labors,  services,  and  the  interests  in 
which  it  has  spent  its  strength.  A  vain,  self-seeking 
man  cannot  speak  of  himself  with  weight  and  effect 
in  any  circumstances.  A  man  of  small  mind  will 
not  comprehend  the  magnanimity  of  speaking  of 
one's  self  with  the  same  openness  as  of  an  indifferent 
person,  if  any  good  cause,  or  noble  interest,  is  perilled 
on  his  personal  credit.     As  it  is  Meekness,  and  not 

33* 


390  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

fiery  passion,  whose  resistance  to  wrong  is  the  most 
impressive,  and  Gentleness  that  wears  the  glory  of 
the  loftiest  Courage,  so  it  is  only  the  utmost  simpli- 
city and  singleness  of  purpose  that  can  gracefully 
break  through  conventional  restraints,  and  speak  of 
itself,  when  need  is,  with  a  just  self-respect.  The 
occasion,  indeed,  must  be  one  that  requires  such  an 
effort;  but  if  so,  this  mingled  humility  in  relation  to 
self,  and  loftiness  of  bearing  in  relation  to  any  con- 
fided trust,  is  only  one  example  of  those  contrasted 
functions,  which  real  greatness  of  Mind  always 
knows  how  to  reconcile.  He  who  loves  the  Truth 
must  bear  any  thing  for  Christ's  sake  and  the  Gos- 
pel's, even  the  pain  of  vindicating  his  personal  credit, 
though  a  generous  spirit  would  more  willingly  bear 
its  cross. 

At  Corinth,  men  attached  to  material  views  of 
Religion,  to  the  superstitions  and  the  machinery  of 
worship,  had  opposed  themselves  to  the  simplicity 
of  the  Gospel  Salvation  as  Paul  preached  it;  and 
to  seduce  his  converts,  they  did  not  hesitate  to  un- 
dermine his  reputation,  and  even  to  deny  his  Apos- 
tolical Authority.  We  have  seen,  in  the  last  Sec- 
tion, how  he  adopts  Boasting  as  a  strange  work ;  as 
in  itself  an  utter  folly,  and  only  justifiable  by  the 
absolute  necessity  of  exposing  false  pretensions  in 
connection  with  pernicious  purposes ;  and  how  at 
last, — in  the  true  spirit  of  Christianity,  that  Great- 
ness consists  in  Service,  that  the  greatest  Benefactor 
of  his  race  is  the  greatest  of  Men,  —  he  reposes  on 
his  infirmities,  his  humiliations,  his  indignities,  his 
persecutions,  as  his  highest  honors,  —  confident  that 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  391 

in  this  kind  of  glory,  the  spirit  of  the  World,  and  of 
the  World's  philosophy,  would  enter  into  no  rivalry 
with  the  Apostle  of  the  Crucified. 

In  the  Chapters  now  before  us,  in  the  continued 
contrast  between  himself  and  those  who  wished  to 
seduce  the  Corinthians  from  the  Simplicity  that  is 
in  Christ,  he  rests  on  those  distinctions  which,  as 
not  flowing  from  personal  qualifications,  exclude 
all  Self-glory  ;  which  were  conferred  upon  him  by 
Divine  favor,  and  were  not  the  fruits  of  his  own 
natural  powers,  —  on  those  visions  and  revelations 
of  the  Lord  which  had  impressed  a  new  direction 
on  his  life,  and  which,  he  here  tells  us,  still  blessed 
and  sustained  his  Christian  course,  —  and  on  the  in- 
firmities which,  offered  to  the  great  work  with  a  true 
devotion.  Divine  Grace  made  sufiScient  for  its  pur- 
poses,—  the  weakness  wherein,  as  in  Gethsemane's 
trembling  and  tears,  God  perfects  His  strength,  — 
the  degradations,  "  the  necessities  and  distresses  for 
Christ's  sake,"  the  obscure,  dishonored  life,  the  ut- 
ter poverty  of  the  Instrument,  by  w^hich  the  living 
Word,  the  spirit  of  the  Gospel,  a  heavenly  Energy, 
worked  out  its  glorious  triumphs  on  the  Earth.  So 
much  indeed  does  he  shrink  from  self-exaltation, 
that  he  marks  these  visions  and  revelations  as  not 
belonging  to  his  own  individuality ;  and  speaks  of 
himself,  as  of  another  person  in  whose  distinctions 
he  had  no  intrinsic  participation :  "  I  knew  a  man 
in  Christ,  who  (whether  in  the  body  I  cannot  tell, 
or  whether  out  of  the  body  I  cannot  tell,  God  know- 
eth)  was  caught  up  to  the  third  heaven.  Concern- 
ing such  an  one  I  will  glory ;  yet  of  myself  I  wiU 


392  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

not  glory,  save  in  my  infirmities."  "  By  the  figura- 
tive expressions  here  employed,  St.  Paul  seems 
merely  to  indicate  the  nearness  in  which  his  spirit 
found  itself  to  God."  *  To  be  carried  into  Heaven, 
to  be  in  the  bosom  of  the  Father,  is  the  Jewish  ex- 
pression to  denote  the  possession  of  a  divine  com- 
munication; and  the  local  presence  of  God  they 
called  the  third  Heavens,  beneath  which  were  the 
starry  Heavens,  and  lower  still  the  aerial  Heavens, 
the  region  of  the  atmosphere  and  clouds.  Thus  it 
is  said  of  Moses,  "  There  arose  not  a  prophet  since 
in  Israel  like  unto  Moses,  whom  the  Lord  knew 
face  to  face  "  ;  f  —  and  Christ  says  of  himself  and 
of  his  own  communications  with  God,  —  whilst  yet, 
in  bodily  presence,  he  was  standing  on  the  Earth 
and  speaking  to  his  Disciples,  — "  And  no  man 
hath  ascended  up  to  Heaven,  but  he  that  came 
down  from  Heaven,  even  the  Son  of  man,  which  is 
in  Heaven."  It  is  evident  from  this,  that  by  being 
in  Heaven  was  meant,  not  a  local  translation,  but  a 
state  of  intimate  communication  with  God. 

It  is  remarkable  that  though  St.  Paul  mentions 
"  these  visions  and  revelations  "  as  evidences  to  him- 
self of  Divine  Favor,  and,  to  his  own  spirit,  undoubt- 
ed signs  of  his  Apostleship ;  yet,  except  so  far  as 
they  had  outward  fruits  and  wrovght  in  Power,  he 
was  aware  that  they  could  not  be  adduced  to  other 
minds  as  Proofs  of  any  thing ;  he  was  aware  of  the 
futility,  as  an  argument,  —  of  the  danger,  as  an  in- 
strument of  deception  with  credulous  minds,  of  ap- 
pealing to  secret  experiences  as  the  grounds  of  spir- 

♦  Billroth.  t  Deut.  xxxiv.  10. 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  393 

itual  distinction.  This  would  be  to  claim  a  glory 
which  lay  out  of  the  reach  of  observation,  —  and 
which  therefore  with  no  modesty  or  justice  could 
be  urged  on  another's  belief.  St.  Paul's  claim  to 
such  communications  was  indeed  supported  by  all 
the  properties  that  could  win  personal  confidence ; 
but  he  does  not  on  this  account  found  pretensions 
to  higher  spiritual  distinctions  than  he  manifests  in 
word  and  deed.  He  would  make  his  claim  to  the 
secret  influence  of  Divine  Grace  strictly  commen- 
surate with  its  outward  works.  The  rapt  elevations 
of  the  spirit  are  rarely  asserted  with  such  a  calm 
suppression  of  the  wildness  of  enthusiasm,  of  the 
extravagance  of  the  Mystic  who  demands  general 
belief  in  visions  which  he  acknowledges  no  eye  has 
witnessed  but  his  own.  The  sixth  verse,  taken  into 
connection  with  what  precedes,  presents  the  rarest 
combination  of  frames  of  mind,  —  a  confidence  in 
ecstatic  visions  with  the  clearest  discrimination  of 
their  relations  to  others,  with  no  desire  to  convert 
a  secret  experience  into  an  argument  or  a  claim, 
except  so  far  as  it  could  be  manifested  by  undoubt- 
ed signs  :  "  I  might  indeed  glory  in  such  things,  and 
speak  only  the  truth,  but  I  forbear,  lest  any  one 
should  think  concerning  me,  above  that  which  he 
seeth  me  to  be,  or  that  which  he  heareth  from  we." 

As  a  further  reason  for  the  suppression  of  spirit- 
ual Pride  in  himself,  St.  Paul  mentions,  that  these 
visions  and  revelations  were  not  only  free  gifts  of 
God,  to  which  he  had  no  intrinsic  claim,  but,  as  if 
purposely  to  check  self-exaltation,  they  were  accom- 
panied by,  or  at  least  coexisted  with,  some  personal 


394  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

infirmity,  some  source  of  humiliation  in  the  work 
of  his  Apostleship,  which  plainly  manifested  that 
the  Divine  treasure  was  in  an  earthern  vessel,  and 
that  the  excellency  of  the  Power  was  of  God,  and 
not  of  him.  What  was  this  "  thorn  in  the  flesh," 
this  instrument  of  the  Tempter  to  prove  him,  we 
are  not  informed  ;  —  and  on  such  points  we  would 
allow  no  license  to  idle  conjecture.  But  though 
we  cannot  specify  it,  the  connection  seems  to  iden- 
tify it  with  that  defect  or  weakness,  whatever  it 
was,  mentioned  in  the  last  Section,  which  threw  an 
air  of  feebleness  over  his  personal  ministrations,  and 
enabled  his  enemies  to  represent  him  as  "  in  bodily 
presence  weak,  and  in  speech  contemptible."  We 
might  naturally  suppose  that  the  treatment  he  re- 
ceived at  Corinth,  and  his  anxiety  for  their  restora- 
tion to  the  Truth,  was  the  "  thorn  in  the  flesh,"  a 
pain  of  spirit  sharper  than  a  wound  ;  but  the  prayer 
to  God  that  it  might  depart  from  him,  with  the 
answer,  "that  through  the  very  instrumentality  of 
weakness,  if  grace  was  sought,  a  Divine  Power 
would  act,  exclude  this  interpretation,  and  limit  it 
as  something  personal  to  St.  Paul.  Otherwise  he 
could  not  say,  "  Since  grace  is  sufficient  for  even 
me,  and  God's  strength  made  perfect  in  my  weak- 
ness, most  gladly  therefore  will  I  glory  in  these  in- 
firmities, that  the  power  of  Christ  may  rest  upon 
me."  It  was  after  the  weakness  of  that  Prayer, 
thrice  renewed,  "  O  my  Father,  if  it  be  possible,  let 
this  cup  pass  from  me,"  that  heavenly  grace  strength- 
ened the  filial  spirit,  which  ever  closed  its  supplica- 
tion with  the  divine  sentiment,  "  Nevertheless,  not 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.    XII.,    XIII.  395 

my  will,  but  thine,  be  done."  It  was  through  his 
humiliation  that  God  wrought  his  exaltation.  Amid 
the  insults  of  the  Judgment  Hall  he  is  most  divine- 
ly great.  The  mocking  crown  of  thorns  has  be- 
come an  everlasting  crown  of  glory.  A  suffering 
and  rejected  Saviour  rules  the  world.  Spiritual 
greatness  made  the  Cross  a  Throne.  It  was  this 
power  of  Christ  that  the  Apostle  prayed  might  rest 
upon  him,  that  when  he  was  weak,  then  might  he 
know  strength. 

At  the  eleventh  verse  there  is  a  sentiment  ex- 
pressed, which  has  a  very  general  application  to  the 
social  relations  of  our  ordinary  life  :  "  I  am  become 
a  fool  in  glorying ;  ye  have  compelled  me,  for  I  ought 
to  have  been  commended  by  you,  since  I  am  in 
nothing  inferior  to  the  very  chiefest  Apostles,  though 
I  am  nothing."  It  is  as  if  he  had  said,  "  The  invid- 
ious necessity  of  urging  my  own  claims  as  a  Repre- 
sentative of  Christ  you  have  imposed  upon  me  ;  you 
compel  me  to  manifest  myself,  that  I  may  shield 
you  from  impostors."  And  so  it  is  in  Life,  often 
only  to  evil  issues:  we  ^^  compel ^^  the  self-regarding 
elements  of  character  into  dangerous  activity  ;  —  we 
excite  by  mere  friction  the  latent  sparks  of  self- 
esteem.  Our  own  tone  and  manner  often  provoke 
the  social  evils  that  we  most  dislike.  Self-assertion, 
—  when  it  has  not  St.  Paul's  excuse,  that  higher  in- 
terests demand  it,  —  will  yet  break  out  under  injus- 
tice, indifference,  or  careless  scorn.  We  show  our- 
selves insensible  tp  Aflfection,  and.  when  we  "  compeV^ 
it,  unhappily  indeed  and  unwisely  for  itself,  to  assert 
its  claim,  we  forget  that  the  exaction  is  only  the 


396  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

retribution  of  our  own  conduct,  and  that,  in  some 
way  or  other,  we  must  pay  our  debt  to  every  human 
being,  —  and  that  in  the  debts  of  Kindness,  as  in 
every  other  obligation  of  life,  instant  acknowledg- 
ment is  the  only  smooth  and  honest  clearance.  We 
do  cold  and  scanty  justice,  and  the  Self- Love  that 
consideration  and  gentle  courtesy  would  have  extin- 
guished, is  aggravated  by  resentment,  or  quickened 
into  open  arrogance.  We  check  what  we  deem  van- 
ity or  presumption  by  hard  and  insulting  resistance, 
and  it  burns  out  against  us  with  ungovernable  vio- 
lence. How  many  a  Parent  suppresses  the  affection 
and  loving  confidence  of  a  child  by  an  over-anxiety 
to  acquire  it,  —  by  seeming  to  exact  that  which  must 
be  free  and  spontaneous,  —  by  encumbering  with 
self-consciousness  the  natural  spring  of  the  heart,  — 
"  compelling "  it,  by  the  most  beautiful  Law  of  its 
nature,  to  shrink  into  concealment  and  reserve! 
How  many  a  Parent  stimulates  immoderate  self- 
esteem  by  injudicious  efforts  to  destroy  it,  by  provok- 
ing a  jealous  self-observation,  and  fixing  a  dangerous 
degree  of  attention  on  the  wounds  and  mortifications 
of  the  most  irritable  class  of  our  feelings  I  There  are 
some  minds  that  act  as  conductors  to  every  selfish 
and  fiery  spark  that  lurks  in  human  character,  so 
that  no  evil  is  latent  in  their  presence ;  and  others 
that  come  in  contact  with  no  noxious  element,  and 
by  the  unaffected  spirit  of  a  just  respect  and  conces- 
sion, awaken  only  the  better  and  happier  parts  of 
character,  and  take  away  all  nourishment  from  the 
spirit  of  self-assertion.  Nothing  is  more  common 
than  to  find  the  same  man,  in  one  Society  or  under 


II.    COR.    CHAPS.   XII.,   XIII.  397 

one  treatment,  sensible,  temperate,  and  modest,  —  in 
another  Society  or  under  another  treatment,  irritable, 
swollen,  and  overbearing.  And  though  no  offence 
can  be  excused  because  of  such  provocations,  it 
may  be  accounted  for,  —  and  it  may  be  avoided,  and 
"  Woe  unto  him  by  wfjom  the  offence  cometh."  It 
is  the  spirit  of  Justice  and  Generosity  in  ourselves, — 
of  true  respect  for  every  social  and  individual  Right, 
which  awakens  all  the  answering  Virtues  in  other 
minds,  and  "  compels  "  Self-Love  itself  to  die  out  in 
presence  of  the  Meekness  of  wisdom.  The  Pre- 
sumption that  will  resist  Rebuke  will  utterly  change 
its  character  before  a  truly  courteous  spirit,  —  and  it 
would  be  well  to  remember  that  every  time  an  evil 
tendency  is  touched,  it  is  confirmed.  And  an  evil 
spirit  cannot  be  conquered  by  an  evil  spirit.  Satan 
will  not  cast  out  Satan.  The  offences  that  provoke 
Anger,  Anger  will  not  care.  Our  own  form  of  Self- 
Love  will  not  extinguish  the  Self-Love  of  another. 
This  is  the  divine  prerogative  of  the  spirit  of  Good- 
ness.    We  can  only  overcome  Evil  with  Good. 

The  remainder  of  the  Epistle  is  occupied  by  St. 
Paul's  entreaty  to  the  Corinthians  that  all  opposition 
between  them  —  all  conflicting  pretensions,  whatever 
could  give  occasion  to  the  humiliation  of  either  — 
should  disappear,  —  that  they  should  return  to  a 
Christian  simplicity  and  purity  of  Life,  and  that  he 
should  have  no  more  occasion  to  speak  of  Authority 
or  Reproof,  but  of  brotherly  Intercourse  and  Love. 
Twice  had  he  altered  a  purpose  of  meeting  them  in 
person,  that  such  close  intercourse  might  not  be 
embittered  by  the  necessary  severity  of  moral  disap- 
proval ;  but  this  forbearance  could  no  longer  be  exer- 

34 


398  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

cised  lest  its  motive  should  be  misconstrued,  and  the 
consciousness  of  weakness  which  his  Opponents  at- 
tributed to  him,  gain  credence  among  them.  Yet, 
disappointed  as  he  had  been,  wounded  in  affection, 
slighted  in  Authority,  most  gladly  would  he  forfeit 
all  opportunity  of  proving  that  the  Power  of  Christ 
was  with  him,  by  any  manifestation  on  their  part 
that  the  Spirit  of  Christ  was  in  them.  To  those  who, 
in  contumacy  and  unbelief,  sought  a  proof  that  Christ 
spoke  in  him,  his  weakness  and  humiliation,  like  that 
of  his  Crucified  Master,  would  not  prevent  the  Power 
of  God  being  manifested  through  him,  to  the  confu- 
sion of  his  Enemies  :  "  For  as  he  who  was  crucified 
in  weakness,  yet  liveth  by  the  power  of  God,  —  so 
we  who  have  a  fellowship  in  his  weakness,  shall  also 
live  to  manifest  the  power  of  God  towards  you." 
"  Try  yourselves,  whether  ye  be  in  the  faith ;  prove 
your  own  selves.  Know  ye  not  your  own  selves 
whether  Jesus  Christ  is  in  you  ?  Are  ye  in  this  re- 
spect destitute  of  proof  ?  But  I  trust  you  will  know 
that  I  am  not  without  proof  that  the  power  of  Christ 
is  with  me.  Yet  I  pray  to  God  that  I  may  be  called 
to  no  exercise  of  authority  against  you ;  —  I  pray, 
not  that  I  may  triumph,  but  that  you  may  do  that 
which  is  good,  even  though,  through  your  penitence 
and  restoration,  my  Authority  should  have  no  out- 
ward vindication.  We  shall  rejoice  that  in  this 
respect  we  remain  as  weak  and  unavenged,  if  you 
will  be  strong ;  for  this  only  we  pray  for,  even  your 
Restoration.  Finally,  Brethren,  farewell :  be  perfect ; 
encourage  and  sustain  each  other ;  be  of  one  mind  ; 
live  in  peace;  —  and  the  God  of  Love  and  Peace 
shall  be  with  you." 


CONCLUSION.  399 

We  have  now  examined  in  detail  the  two  Epistles 
to  the  Corinthians.  They  are  the  liveliest  Pictures 
we  possess  of  the  first  action  of  Christianity  on  the 
Religion  and  Philosophy  of  the  Grecian  mind.  They 
exhibit,  principally,  the  doctrines  of  spiritual  Free- 
dom ;  of  the  direct  intercourse  of  each  soul  with 
God  without  the  aid  of  System,  Ritual,  or  Priest- 
hood ;  of  the  moral  Salvation  of  oneness  of  heart  and 
will  with  God,  through  the  influence  and  attraction 
of  His  Christ :  —  and  in  their  antagonist  aspects, 
they  are  mainly  opposed  to  asceticism ;  to  super- 
stitious observances  ;  to  violations  of  unity  of  spirit  > 
and  to  the  admixture  of  speculative  tenets  with  the 
simple  acceptance  of  Christ  as  the  Law  of  Life,  the 
Image  of  the  Father,  and  the  First-born  of  many 
brethren  to  the  holy  Power  and  glorious  Liberty  of 
a  Son  of  God.  It  is  impossible,  I  think,  to  read 
these  two  Epistles,  and  doubt  that  they  sprung  out 
of  real  circumstances,  —  that  they  are  the  intense 
strivings  of  an  earnest  and  generous  Mind  with  an 
existing  condition  of  things.  They  are  not  Epistles 
that  one  who  wished  to  do  honor  to  Christianity 
would  have  forged.  They  exhibit  no  marvellous  tri- 
umphs ;  —  they  detail  freely  the  humiliations  of  its 
Apostle;  —  they  show  him  meeting  suspicions  and 
charges,  which  many  a  man,  with  not  more  virtue, 
but  with  less  love,  would  deem  himself  exonerated 
from  noticing ;  they  show  the  patience  and  perse- 
verance with  which  the  divine  Charity  that  seeketh 
not  its  own  can  contend  for  Holiness  and  Truth, 
against  their  natural  enemies.  The  authenticity  of 
these  Epistles  is  unquestioned  by  any  man,  whether 


400  SECOND    EPISTLE    TO    THE    CORINTHIANS. 

believer  or  unbeliever ;  and  so  far  as  Christianity  can 
be  established  by  these  Epistles,  it  is  established. 

And  if,  in  the  last  place,  and  for  a  moment,  we 
refer  to  the  confirmations  which  these  Epistles  af- 
ford of  that  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom,  which  reveals 
in  God  a  Father,  —  in  Christ  His  holy  human  child, 
what  all  the  Brethren  of  that  Master  are  called  to 
be,  —  and  in  the  human  Soul,  to  use  another 
Apostle's  words,  "  a  partaker  of  the  divine  Nature," 
a  spirit  capable  of  being  taken  into  communion  with 
the  Father  of  Spirits,  —  we  do  so,  because,  standing 
against  the  general  faith  of  Christendom,  we  are 
required  by  every  Law  of  humility  to  lose  no  op- 
portunity of  examining  whether  the  decisive  testi- 
mony is  with  us  or  against  us.  The  Father,  —  the 
Christ,  —  the  spirit  of  God  in  every  soul,  wiUing,  if 
we  will  permit  it,  to  draw  us  more  and  more  towards 
him  who  had  that  Spirit  without  measure, — is  not 
this  the  substance  of  Christianity,  the  Gospel  lesson 
of  God  and  of  Religion  ? 

Had  we  to  state  our  Faith,  it  should  be  in  the 
Baptismal  formula  :  "  The  Father,  —  the  Son,  — 
the  Holy  Spirit "  in  Man,  to  unite  him  with  God  the 
Source,  and  with  Christ  the  Perfection  of  his  Na- 
ture ;  —  or,  it  should  be  in  the  Benediction  which 
closes  this  Epistle :  "  The  grace  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  and  the  love  of  God,  and  the  fellowship  of 
the  Holy  Spirit,  be  with  you  all  I "     Amen. 


THE    END. 


Date  Due 

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